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Any reader who thoughtfully delves into the legendary epic novel by Leo Tolstoy "War and Peace" encounters images of amazing heroes. One of these is Andrei Bolkonsky, an outstanding person with a multifaceted character.
“... A short, very handsome young man with certain dry features” - this is how Leo Nikolayevich Tolstoy describes his hero at the first meeting of the reader with him at the evening of Anna Pavlovna Sherer. - Everything in his figure, from a tired, bored look to a quiet measured step, represented the sharpest contrast with his small, lively wife.
Apparently, everyone who was in the living room was not only familiar to him, but he was already so tired of looking at them and listening to them that he was very bored ... ”Most of all, the young man was bored when he saw the face of his wife.
It would seem that nothing at this evening could cheer up the young man, and he perked up only when he saw his friend, Pierre Bezukhov. From this we can conclude that Andrei appreciates friendship.
The young prince Bolkonsky has such qualities as nobility, respect for elders (it is enough to trace how he loved his father, calling him “You, father ...”), as well as education and patriotism.
In his fate, a time of severe trials will come, but for now he is a young man whom secular society loves and accepts.
The values of Andrei Bolkonsky throughout the novel "War and Peace" are gradually changing. At the beginning of the work, an ambitious young man, by all means, longs to receive human recognition and glory as a brave warrior. “I love nothing but glory, human love. Death, wounds, loss of family, nothing scares me,” he exclaims, wanting to go to war with Napoleon.
We suggest that you familiarize yourself with the novel by Leo Tolstoy “War and Peace”
Secular life seems empty to him, and the young man wants to be useful to society. At first he serves as an adjutant at Kutuzov, but in the battle of Austerlitz he is wounded and ends up in the hospital. The family considers Andrei missing, but for Bolkonsky himself, this time has become very important for a reassessment of values. The young man is disappointed in his former idol Napoleon, seeing him as a worthless man, rejoicing in the death of people.
“At that moment, Napoleon seemed to him such a small, insignificant person in comparison with what was now happening between his soul and this high, endless sky with clouds running across it.” Now that the goal of Bolkonsky's life - to achieve fame and recognition - has collapsed, the hero is seized by strong emotional experiences.
Having recovered, he decides not to fight anymore, but to devote himself to his family. Unfortunately, this did not happen.
The next blow for Andrei Bolkonsky was the death during childbirth of his wife Elizabeth. If it were not for the meeting with his friend Pierre Bezukhov, who tried to convince him that life is not over, and that it is necessary to fight, despite the trials, it would be much harder for the hero to survive such grief. “I live and it’s not my fault, therefore, it’s necessary somehow better, without interfering with anyone, to live to death,” he lamented, sharing his experiences with Pierre.
But, thanks to the sincere support of a comrade who convinced a friend that “one must live, one must love, one must believe,” the hero of the novel survived. During this difficult period, Andrei not only cheered up his soul, but also met his long-awaited love.
For the first time, Natasha and Andrei meet at the Rostov estate, where the prince comes to spend the night. Disappointed in life, Bolkonsky understands that finally the happiness of true and bright love smiled at him.
A pure and purposeful girl opened his eyes to the need to live for the people, to do good for others. A new, hitherto unknown feeling of love flared up in Andrei's heart, which Natasha also shared.
They got engaged, and maybe they would make a great couple. But circumstances intervened again. In the life of Andrei's beloved, a fleeting passion appeared, which led to disastrous consequences. It seemed to her that she fell in love with Anatole Kuragin, and although the girl later repented of treason, Andrei could no longer forgive her and treat her the same way. “Of all people, I didn’t love anyone else and didn’t hate like her,” he admitted to his friend Pierre. The engagement was broken off.
Going to the next war, Prince Bolknonsky no longer pursues ambitious plans. His main goal is to protect the Motherland and his people from the attacked enemy. Now Andrei is fighting alongside ordinary people, soldiers and officers, and does not consider it shameful. “... He was all devoted to the affairs of his regiment, he was caring about his people and officers and affectionate with them. In the regiment they called him our prince, they were proud of him and loved him ... ”- Leo Tolstoy writes, characterizing his favorite hero.
The wound in the Battle of Borodino was fatal for Prince Andrei.
Already in the hospital, he meets with his former lover Natasha Rostova, and feelings between them flare up with renewed vigor. “...Natasha, I love you too much. More than anything…” he admits.
However, this reborn love has no chance, because Bolkonsky is dying. The devoted girl spends the last days of Andrey's life next to him.
He not only knew that he was going to die, but he felt that he was dying, that he was already half dead. He experienced the consciousness of alienation from everything earthly and the joyful and strange lightness of being. He, without haste and without anxiety, expected what lay ahead of him. That formidable, eternal, unknown, distant, the presence of which he never ceased to feel throughout his life, was now close to him and - by that strange lightness of being that he experienced - almost understandable and felt ... ".
So sadly ended the earthly life of Andrei Bolkonsky. He experienced many sorrows and troubles, but the path to eternity opened ahead.
Every thoughtful reader can draw a conclusion: how much grief and misfortune the war has brought to mankind. Indeed, if not for the mortal wound that Andrei received on the battlefield, perhaps their love with Natasha Rostova would have had a happy continuation. After all, they loved each other so much and could symbolize the ideal of family relationships. But, alas, a person does not spare his own kind, and ridiculous confrontations take away many lives of people who, left to live, could bring considerable benefit to the Fatherland.
It is this thought that runs through the entire work of Leo Tolstoy.
Best quotes about Prince Andrei Bolkonsky will be useful when writing essays dedicated to one of the main characters of the epic novel L.N. Tolstoy "War and Peace". The quotations present a description of Andrei Bolkonsky: his appearance, inner world, spiritual quest, a description of the main episodes of his life, the relationship between Bolkonsky and Natasha Rostova, Bolkonsky and Pierre Bezukhov, Bolkonsky's thoughts about the meaning of life, about love and happiness, his opinion about war.
Quick jump to quotes from War and Peace volumes:
(Description of the appearance of Andrei Bolkonsky at the beginning of the novel. 1805)
At that moment, a new face entered the living room. The new face was the young Prince Andrei Bolkonsky, the husband of the little princess. Prince Bolkonsky was short, a very handsome young man with definite and dry features. Everything in his figure, from the tired, bored look to the quiet measured step, represented the sharpest contrast with his little lively wife. He, apparently, was not only familiar with everyone in the drawing-room, but he was already so tired of looking at them and listening to them that he was very bored. Of all the faces that bored him, the face of his pretty wife seemed to bore him the most. With a grimace that ruined his handsome face, he turned away from her. He kissed Anna Pavlovna's hand and, screwing up his eyes, looked around the whole company.
(Qualities of the character of Andrei Bolkonsky)
Pierre considered Prince Andrei the model of all perfections precisely because Prince Andrei combined to the highest degree all those qualities that Pierre did not have and which can be most closely expressed by the concept of willpower. Pierre was always amazed at Prince Andrei's ability to deal calmly with all kinds of people, his extraordinary memory, erudition (he read everything, knew everything, had an idea about everything), and most of all his ability to work and study. If Pierre was often struck by the lack of the ability of dreamy philosophizing in Andrei (which Pierre was especially prone to), then he saw this not as a drawback, but as a strength.
(Dialogue between Andrei Bolkonsky and Pierre Bezukhov about the war)
“If everyone fought only according to their convictions, there would be no war,” he said.
“That would be wonderful,” said Pierre.
Prince Andrew chuckled.
- It may very well be that it would be wonderful, but this will never happen ...
“Well, why are you going to war?” asked Pierre.
- For what? I dont know. So it is necessary. Besides, I'm going…” He stopped. “I am going because this life I lead here, this life, is not for me!”
(Andrei Bolkonsky, in a conversation with Pierre Bezukhov, expresses his disappointment with marriage, women and secular society)
Never, never marry, my friend; here's my advice to you, don't get married until you tell yourself that you've done all you can and until you stop loving the woman you chose, until you see her clearly, and then you will make a cruel and irreparable mistake. Marry an old man, good for nothing... Otherwise, everything that is good and lofty in you will be lost. Everything is wasted on trifles.
My wife, - Prince Andrei continued, - is a wonderful woman. This is one of those rare women with whom you can be dead for your honor; but, my God, what would I not give now not to be married! This I tell you alone and first, because I love you.
Drawing rooms, gossip, balls, vanity, insignificance - this is a vicious circle from which I cannot get out. I am now going to war, to the greatest war that has ever been, and I know nothing and am no good.<…>Selfishness, vanity, stupidity, insignificance in everything - these are women when they are shown as they are. You look at them in the light, it seems that there is something, but nothing, nothing, nothing! Yes, do not marry, my soul, do not marry.
(Conversation of Andrei Bolkonsky with Princess Marya)
I cannot reproach, have not reproached and will never reproach my wife for anything, and I myself cannot reproach myself with anything in relation to her, and this will always be the case, in whatever circumstances I may be. But if you want to know the truth... you want to know if I'm happy? No. Is she happy? No. Why is this? Don't know...
(Bolkonsky is about to leave for the army)
In moments of departure and a change in life, people who are able to think about their actions usually find a serious mood of thoughts. In these moments, the past is usually verified and plans for the future are made. The face of Prince Andrei was very thoughtful and tender. With his hands folded back, he paced the room quickly from corner to corner, looking ahead of him, and shaking his head thoughtfully. Was he afraid to go to war, was he sad to leave his wife—perhaps both, but apparently not wanting to be seen in such a position, when he heard footsteps in the hallway, he hurriedly freed his hands, stopped at the table, as if he was tying the cover of the box, and assumed his usual calm and impenetrable expression.
(Description of the appearance of Andrei Bolkonsky after he entered the army)
Despite the fact that not much time has passed since Prince Andrei left Russia, he has changed a lot during this time. In the expression of his face, in his movements, in his gait, there was almost no noticeable former pretense, fatigue and laziness; he had the appearance of a man who has no time to think about the impression he makes on others, and is busy with pleasant and interesting business. His face expressed more satisfaction with himself and those around him; his smile and look were more cheerful and attractive.
(Bolkonsky - Kutuzov's adjutant. Attitude in the army towards Prince Andrei)
Kutuzov, whom he caught up with back in Poland, received him very affectionately, promised him not to forget him, distinguished him from other adjutants, took him with him to Vienna and gave him more serious assignments. From Vienna, Kutuzov wrote to his old comrade, the father of Prince Andrei.
“Your son,” he wrote, “gives hope to be an officer who excels in his knowledge, firmness and diligence. I consider myself fortunate to have such a subordinate at hand.”
At Kutuzov's headquarters, among his comrades-colleagues and in the army in general, Prince Andrei, as well as in St. Petersburg society, had two completely opposite reputations. Some, a minority, recognized Prince Andrei as something special from themselves and from all other people, expected great success from him, listened to him, admired him and imitated him; and with these people, Prince Andrei was simple and pleasant. Others, the majority, did not like Prince Andrei, they considered him an inflated, cold and unpleasant person. But with these people, Prince Andrei knew how to position himself in such a way that he was respected and even feared.
(Bolkonsky strives for fame)
This news was sad and at the same time pleasant to Prince Andrei. As soon as he learned that the Russian army was in such a hopeless situation, it occurred to him that it was precisely for him that it was destined to lead the Russian army out of this situation, that here it was, that Toulon, which would lead him out of the ranks of unknown officers and open to him the first path to glory! Listening to Bilibin, he was already thinking how, having arrived at the army, he would present an opinion at the military council that alone would save the army, and how he alone would be entrusted with the execution of this plan.
“Stop joking, Bilibin,” said Bolkonsky.
“I tell you sincerely and in a friendly way. Judge. Where and for what will you go now that you can stay here? One of two things awaits you (he collected the skin over his left temple): either you don’t reach the army and peace will be concluded, or defeat and shame with the entire Kutuzov army.
And Bilibin loosened his skin, feeling that his dilemma was irrefutable.
“I can’t judge this,” said Prince Andrei coldly, but thought: “I’m going in order to save the army.”
(Battle of Shengraben, 1805. Bolkonsky hopes to prove himself in battle and find "his Toulon")
Prince Andrei stopped on horseback on the battery, looking at the smoke of the gun from which the cannonball flew out. His eyes darted across the vast expanse. He only saw that the hitherto immobile masses of the French were swaying and that there really was a battery to the left. It hasn't blown smoke yet. Two French cavalry, probably adjutants, galloped up the mountain. Downhill, probably to strengthen the chain, a clearly visible small column of the enemy was moving. The smoke of the first shot had not yet dissipated, when another smoke and a shot appeared. The battle has begun. Prince Andrei turned his horse around and galloped back to Grunt to look for Prince Bagration. Behind him he heard the cannonade becoming more frequent and louder. Apparently, ours began to respond. Below, in the place where the parliamentarians were passing, rifle shots were heard.
"Began! Here it is!" - thought Prince Andrei, feeling how blood began to rush to his heart more often. “But where? How will my Toulon be expressed? he thought.
(Dreams of Andrei Bolkonsky about military glory on the eve of the battle of Austerlitz)
The military council, at which Prince Andrei failed to express his opinion, as he hoped, left an unclear and disturbing impression on him. Who was right: Dolgorukov with Weyrother or Kutuzov with Langeron and others who did not approve of the plan of attack, he did not know. “But was it really impossible for Kutuzov to directly express his thoughts to the sovereign? Can't it be done differently? Is it really necessary to risk tens of thousands and my, my life because of court and personal considerations? he thought.
“Yes, it’s very possible that they’ll kill you tomorrow,” he thought. And suddenly, at this thought of death, a whole series of recollections, the most distant and most sincere, rose in his imagination; he remembered the last farewell to his father and wife; he remembered the first days of his love for her; remembered her pregnancy, and he felt sorry for both her and himself, and he, in a primary softened and agitated state, left the hut in which he stood with Nesvitsky, and began to walk in front of the house.
The night was misty, and moonlight shone mysteriously through the mist. “Yes, tomorrow, tomorrow! he thought. “Tomorrow, perhaps, everything will be over for me, all these memories will no longer exist, all these memories will no longer have any meaning for me. Tomorrow, maybe - even probably tomorrow, I foresee it, for the first time I will finally have to show everything that I can do. And he imagined the battle, the loss of it, the concentration of the battle on one point and the confusion of all commanding persons. And now that happy moment, that Toulon, which he had been waiting for so long, finally appears to him. He firmly and clearly expresses his opinion to Kutuzov, and to Weyrother, and to the emperors. Everyone is amazed at the correctness of his ideas, but no one undertakes to fulfill it, and so he takes a regiment, a division, pronounces a condition that no one should interfere with his orders, and leads his division to a decisive point and alone wins. What about death and suffering? says another voice. But Prince Andrei does not answer this voice and continues his successes. He bears the rank of army duty officer under Kutuzov, but he does everything alone. The next battle is won by him alone. Kutuzov is replaced, he is appointed ... Well, and then? - says another voice again, - and then, if you are not wounded ten times before, killed or deceived; well, then what? “Well, and then ... - Prince Andrei answers himself, - I don’t know what will happen next, I don’t want and I can’t know; but if I want this, I want fame, I want to be known to people, I want to be loved by them, then it’s not my fault that I want this, that I want this alone, I live for this alone. Yes, for this one! I will never tell anyone this, but, my God! what am I to do if I love nothing but glory, human love. Death, wounds, loss of family, nothing scares me. And no matter how dear and dear to me are many people - my father, sister, wife - the people dearest to me - but, no matter how terrible and unnatural it seems, I will give them all now for a moment of glory, triumph over people, for love. to myself people whom I do not know and will not know, for the love of these people, ”he thought, listening to the conversation in Kutuzov’s yard. In the yard of Kutuzov, the voices of orderlies packing up were heard; one voice, probably a coachman, teasing the old Kutuzov cook, whom Prince Andrei knew and whose name was Tit, said: “Tit, and Tit?”
"Well," replied the old man.
"Titus, go thresh," said the joker.
“And yet, I love and cherish only the triumph over all of them, I cherish this mysterious power and glory, which here rushes over me in this fog!”
(1805 Battle of Austerlitz. Prince Andrei leads a battalion on the attack with a banner in his hands)
Kutuzov, accompanied by his adjutants, rode at a pace behind the carabinieri.
Having traveled half a verst at the tail of the column, he stopped at a lonely abandoned house (probably a former tavern) near the fork of two roads. Both roads descended downhill, and troops marched along both.
The fog began to disperse, and indefinitely, at a distance of two versts, enemy troops could already be seen on opposite hills. To the left below the shooting became more audible. Kutuzov stopped talking to the Austrian general. Prince Andrei, standing somewhat behind, peered at them and, wanting to ask the adjutant for a telescope, turned to him.
“Look, look,” this adjutant said, looking not at distant troops, but down the mountain in front of him. - It's French!
Two generals and adjutants began to grab the pipe, pulling it out one from the other. All the faces suddenly changed, and horror was expressed on everyone. The French were supposed to be two miles away from us, and they suddenly appeared unexpectedly in front of us.
"Is this an enemy?.. No!.. Yes, look, he is... probably... What is this?" voices were heard.
Prince Andrey with a simple eye saw a dense column of French rising to the right towards the Apsheronians, no further than five hundred paces from the place where Kutuzov was standing.
“Here it is, the decisive moment has come! It came to me, ”thought Prince Andrei, and, hitting his horse, rode up to Kutuzov.
“We must stop the Apsheronians,” he shouted, “your excellency!”
But at the same moment everything was covered in smoke, close shooting was heard, and a naively frightened voice, two steps away from Prince Andrei, shouted: “Well, brothers, the Sabbath!” And as if this voice was a command. At this voice, everyone rushed to run.
Mixed, ever-increasing crowds fled back to the place where five minutes ago the troops passed by the emperors. It was not only difficult to stop this crowd, but it was impossible not to move back together with the crowd. Bolkonsky only tried to keep up with Kutuzov and looked around, perplexed and unable to understand what was happening in front of him. Nesvitsky, with an angry look, red and not like himself, shouted to Kutuzov that if he did not leave now, he would probably be taken prisoner. Kutuzov stood in the same place and, without answering, took out his handkerchief. Blood was flowing from his cheek. Prince Andrei pushed his way up to him.
- Are you injured? he asked, barely able to control the trembling of his lower jaw.
- The wound is not here, but where! said Kutuzov, pressing the handkerchief to his wounded cheek and pointing to the fugitives.
- Stop them! he shouted, and at the same time, probably convinced that it was impossible to stop them, he hit his horse and rode to the right.
The crowd of fugitives, again surging, took him with them and dragged him back.
The troops fled in such a dense crowd that, once they got into the middle of the crowd, it was difficult to get out of it. Who shouted: “Go, why hesitated?” Who immediately, turning around, fired into the air; who beat the horse on which Kutuzov himself rode. With the greatest effort, getting out of the stream of the crowd to the left, Kutuzov with a retinue, reduced by more than half, went to the sounds of nearby gun shots. Getting out of the crowd of fleeing, Prince Andrei, trying to keep up with Kutuzov, saw on the slope of the mountain, in the smoke, a Russian battery still firing and the French running up to it. The Russian infantry stood higher, moving neither forward to help the battery, nor backward in the same direction as the fugitives. The general on horseback separated from this infantry and rode up to Kutuzov. Only four people remained from Kutuzov's retinue. Everyone was pale and looked at each other silently.
"Stop those bastards!" - panting, said Kutuzov to the regimental commander, pointing to the fugitives; but at the same moment, as if in punishment for these words, like a swarm of birds, bullets whistled over the regiment and Kutuzov's retinue.
The French attacked the battery and, seeing Kutuzov, fired at him. With this volley, the regimental commander grabbed his leg; several soldiers fell, and the ensign, who was standing with the banner, let go of it; the banner staggered and fell, lingering on the guns of neighboring soldiers. Soldiers without a command began to shoot.
— Oh-ooh! Kutuzov murmured with an expression of despair and looked around. “Bolkonsky,” he whispered in a voice trembling from the consciousness of his senile impotence. “Bolkonsky,” he whispered, pointing to the disorganized battalion and the enemy, “what is this?
But before he finished this word, Prince Andrei, feeling tears of shame and anger rising to his throat, was already jumping off his horse and running to the banner.
- Guys, go ahead! he shouted childishly.
"Here it is!" - thought Prince Andrei, grabbing the flagpole and hearing with pleasure the whistle of bullets, obviously directed specifically against him. Several soldiers fell.
- Hooray! shouted Prince Andrei, barely holding the heavy banner in his hands, and ran forward with undoubted confidence that the whole battalion would run after him.
Indeed, he ran only a few steps alone. One, another soldier set off, and the whole battalion shouted "Hurrah!" ran ahead and overtook him. The non-commissioned officer of the battalion, running up, took the banner that wavered from the weight in the hands of Prince Andrei, but was immediately killed. Prince Andrei again grabbed the banner and, dragging it by the shaft, fled with the battalion. In front of him, he saw our gunners, some of whom were fighting, others were throwing their cannons and running towards him; he also saw French infantry soldiers seizing artillery horses and turning the cannons. Prince Andrei with the battalion was already twenty paces from the guns. He heard the unceasing whistle of bullets above him, and the soldiers to the right and left of him ceaselessly groaned and fell. But he did not look at them; he peered only at what was happening in front of him - on the battery. He clearly saw already one figure of a red-haired artilleryman with a shako knocked to one side, pulling a bannik from one side, while a French soldier was pulling a bannik towards him from the other side. Prince Andrei already saw the clearly bewildered and at the same time embittered expression on the faces of these two people, who apparently did not understand what they were doing.
"What are they doing? thought Prince Andrei, looking at them. Why doesn't the red-haired gunner run when he has no weapons? Why doesn't the Frenchman prick him? Before he has time to run, the Frenchman will remember the gun and stab him.”
Indeed, another Frenchman, with a gun at the ready, ran up to the fighters, and the fate of the red-haired gunner, who still did not understand what awaited him, and triumphantly pulled out a banner, was to be decided. But Prince Andrei did not see how it ended. As if with a full swing with a strong stick, one of the nearest soldiers, as it seemed to him, hit him in the head. It hurt a little, and most importantly, unpleasant, because this pain entertained him and prevented him from seeing what he was looking at.
"What is it? I'm falling! my legs give way, ”he thought, and fell on his back. He opened his eyes, hoping to see how the fight between the French and the artillerymen ended, and wishing to know whether the red-haired artilleryman had been killed or not, whether the guns had been taken or saved. But he didn't take anything. Above him there was nothing now but the sky—a high sky, not clear, but still immeasurably high, with gray clouds quietly creeping across it. “How quiet, calm and solemn, not at all the way I ran,” thought Prince Andrei, “not the way we ran, shouted and fought; not at all like the Frenchman and the artilleryman dragging each other's bannik with embittered and frightened faces - not at all like the clouds crawling across this high, endless sky. How could I not have seen this lofty sky before? And how happy I am that I finally got to know him. Yes! everything is empty, everything is a lie, except for this endless sky. Nothing, nothing but him. But even that is not even there, there is nothing but silence, calmness. And thank God!.."
(The sky of Austerlitz as an important episode on the path of the spiritual development of Prince Andrei. 1805)
On Pratsenskaya Hill, on the very spot where he fell with the staff of the banner in his hands, Prince Andrei Bolkonsky lay bleeding, and, without knowing it, groaned with a quiet, pitiful and childish moan.
By evening, he stopped moaning and completely calmed down. He did not know how long his oblivion lasted. Suddenly he felt alive again and suffering from a burning and tearing pain in his head.
“Where is it, this high sky, which I did not know until now and saw today? was his first thought. - And I did not know this suffering until now. But where am I?
He began to listen and heard the sounds of the approaching stomp of horses and the sounds of voices speaking in French. He opened his eyes. Above him was again the same high sky with still higher floating clouds, through which a blue infinity could be seen. He did not turn his head and did not see those who, judging by the sound of hooves and voices, drove up to him and stopped.
The riders who arrived were Napoleon, accompanied by two adjutants. Bonaparte, circling the battlefield, gave the last orders to reinforce the batteries firing at the Augusta dam, and examined the dead and wounded who remained on the battlefield.
— De beaux hommes! (Glorious people!) - said Napoleon, looking at the dead Russian grenadier, who, with his face buried in the ground and a blackened nape, was lying on his stomach, throwing back one already stiffened arm.
— Les munitions des pièces de position sont épuisées, sire! (There are no more battery shells, Your Majesty!) - said at that time the adjutant, who had arrived from the batteries firing at Augustus.
- Faites avancer celles de la réserve (Order to bring from the reserves), - said Napoleon, and, driving off a few steps, he stopped over Prince Andrei, who was lying on his back with a flagpole thrown beside him (the banner had already been taken by the French like a trophy).
- Voilà une belle mort (Here is a beautiful death), - said Napoleon, looking at Bolkonsky.
Prince Andrei understood that this was said about him and that Napoleon was talking about it. He heard the name sire (Your Majesty) of the one who said these words. But he heard these words as if he heard the buzzing of a fly. Not only was he not interested in them, but he did not notice them, and immediately forgot them. His head burned; he felt that he was bleeding, and he saw above him a distant, lofty and eternal sky. He knew that it was Napoleon - his hero, but at that moment Napoleon seemed to him such a small, insignificant person in comparison with what was now happening between his soul and this high, endless sky with clouds running across it. It was absolutely indifferent to him at that moment, no matter who was standing over him, no matter what they said about him; he was only glad that people had stopped over him, and only wished that these people would help him and bring him back to life, which seemed to him so beautiful, because he understood it in such a different way now. He gathered all his strength to move and make some kind of sound. He feebly moved his leg and produced a pitiful, weak, painful groan.
- BUT! he is alive,” said Napoleon. “Raise this young man, ce jeune homme, and carry him to the dressing station!”
Prince Andrei did not remember anything further: he lost consciousness from the terrible pain that was caused to him by laying on a stretcher, jolts while moving and probing the wound at the dressing station. He woke up only at the end of the day, when he, having been connected with other Russian wounded and captured officers, was carried to the hospital. On this movement he felt a little fresher and could look around and even talk.
The first words he heard when he woke up were those of a French escort officer who hurriedly said:
- We must stop here: the emperor will pass now; he will be pleased to see these captive masters.
“Today there are so many prisoners, almost the entire Russian army, that he probably got bored with it,” said another officer.
- Well, however! This one, they say, is the commander of the entire guard of Emperor Alexander, ”said the first, pointing to a wounded Russian officer in a white cavalry guard uniform.
Bolkonsky recognized Prince Repnin, whom he met in St. Petersburg society. Next to him stood another, nineteen-year-old boy, also a wounded cavalry guard officer.
Bonaparte, riding up at a gallop, stopped the horse.
- Who is the eldest? he said, seeing the prisoners.
They named the colonel, Prince Repnin.
- Are you the commander of the cavalry regiment of Emperor Alexander? Napoleon asked.
“I commanded a squadron,” answered Repnin.
“Your regiment honestly fulfilled its duty,” said Napoleon.
“The praise of a great commander is the best reward for a soldier,” said Repnin.
“I give it to you with pleasure,” said Napoleon. Who is this young man next to you?
Prince Repnin named Lieutenant Sukhtelen.
Looking at him, Napoleon said, smiling:
- Il est venu bien jeune se frotter à nous (He was young when he put himself up to fight with us).
“Youth does not prevent one from being brave,” said Sukhtelen in a broken voice.
“A fine answer,” said Napoleon, “young man, you will go far!”
Prince Andrei, for the sake of completeness of the trophy of the captives, was also put forward, in front of the emperor, could not help but attract his attention. Napoleon, apparently, remembered that he had seen him on the field, and, addressing him, used the very name of the young man - jeune homme, under which Bolkonsky was first reflected in his memory.
— Et vous, jeune homme? Well, what about you, young man? he turned to him. “How do you feel, mon brave?”
Despite the fact that five minutes before this, Prince Andrei could say a few words to the soldiers who carried him, he now, directly fixing his eyes on Napoleon, was silent ... All the interests that occupied Napoleon seemed so insignificant to him at that moment, so petty it seemed to him that his hero himself, with this petty vanity and joy of victory, in comparison with that high, just and kind sky, which he saw and understood, that he could not answer him.
Yes, and everything seemed so useless and insignificant in comparison with that strict and majestic structure of thought, which caused in him a weakening of forces from the flow of blood, suffering and the imminent expectation of death. Looking into Napoleon's eyes, Prince Andrei thought about the insignificance of greatness, the insignificance of life, which no one could understand the meaning of, and the even greater insignificance of death, the meaning of which no one could understand and explain from the living.
The emperor, without waiting for an answer, turned away and, driving off, turned to one of the chiefs:
“Let them take care of these gentlemen and take them to my bivouac; have my doctor Larrey examine their wounds. Goodbye, Prince Repnin. And he touched the horse and rode on at a gallop.
There was a radiance of self-satisfaction and happiness on his face.
The soldiers who brought Prince Andrei and removed from him the golden icon that they came across, hung on his brother by Princess Marya, seeing the kindness with which the emperor treated the prisoners, hastened to return the icon.
Prince Andrei did not see who and how put it on again, but on his chest, over and above his uniform, suddenly appeared a small icon on a small gold chain.
“It would be nice,” thought Prince Andrei, looking at this icon, which his sister hung on him with such feeling and reverence, “it would be nice if everything were as clear and simple as it seems to Princess Marya. How good it would be to know where to look for help in this life and what to expect after it there, beyond the grave! How happy and calm I would be if I could now say: Lord, have mercy on me!.. But to whom shall I say this? Either the power - indefinite, incomprehensible, which I not only cannot address, but which I cannot express in words - great everything or nothing, - he said to himself, - or is it that God who is sewn up here, in this amulet, Princess Mary? Nothing, nothing is true, except for the insignificance of everything that is clear to me, and the greatness of something incomprehensible, but the most important!
The stretcher moved. At every push he again felt unbearable pain; the feverish state intensified, and he began to rave. Those dreams of a father, wife, sister and future son and the tenderness that he experienced on the night before the battle, the figure of a small, insignificant Napoleon and above all the high sky - were the main basis of his feverish ideas.
A quiet life and calm family happiness in the Bald Mountains seemed to him. He was already enjoying this happiness when suddenly little Napoleon appeared with his indifferent, limited and happy look from the misfortune of others, and doubts, torments began, and only heaven promised peace. By morning all dreams had mixed up and merged into chaos and darkness of unconsciousness and oblivion, which, in the opinion of Larrey, Dr. Napoleonov himself, were much more likely to be resolved by death than by recovery.
- C "est un sujet nerveux et bilieux," said Larrey, "il n" en réchappera pas (This is a nervous and bilious subject - he will not recover).
Prince Andrei, among other hopelessly wounded, was handed over to the care of the inhabitants.
(The Bolkonsky family does not know if Prince Andrei is alive or died in the Battle of Austerlitz)
Two months passed after receiving news in the Bald Mountains about the Battle of Austerlitz and the death of Prince Andrei. And despite all the letters through the embassy and despite all the searches, his body was not found, and he was not among the prisoners. The worst thing for his relatives was that there was still the hope that he had been raised by the inhabitants on the battlefield and, perhaps, was recovering or dying somewhere alone, among strangers, and unable to let himself be carried. . In the newspapers, from which the old prince first learned about the defeat of Austerlitz, it was written, as always, very briefly and vaguely, that the Russians, after brilliant battles, had to retreat and made a retreat in perfect order. The old prince understood from this official news that ours had been defeated. A week after the newspaper that brought the news of the Battle of Austerlitz, a letter arrived from Kutuzov, who informed the prince about the fate that befell his son.
“Your son, in my eyes,” Kutuzov wrote, “with a banner in his hands, ahead of the regiment, fell a hero worthy of his father and his fatherland. To the general regret of me and the whole army, it is still unknown whether he is alive or not. I flatter myself and you with the hope that your son is alive, because otherwise, among the officers found on the battlefield, about whom the list was submitted to me through parliamentarians, and he would have been named.
(March 1806 Prince Andrei returns home after being wounded. His wife Lisa dies after giving birth to a son)
Princess Marya threw on her shawl and ran to meet the travelers. When she passed the front hall, she saw through the window that some kind of carriage and lamps were standing at the entrance. She went out onto the stairs. A tallow candle stood on the railing post and flowed from the wind. The waiter Philip, with a frightened face and with another candle in his hand, was standing below, on the first landing of the stairs. Even lower, around the bend, on the stairs, steps could be heard moving in warm boots. And some familiar voice, as it seemed to Princess Mary, was saying something.
Then a voice said something else, Demyan answered something, and steps in warm boots began to approach faster along the invisible turn of the stairs. "This is Andrey! thought Princess Mary. “No, it can’t be, it would be too unusual,” she thought, and at the very moment she thought this, on the platform on which the waiter was standing with a candle, the face and figure of Prince Andrei in a fur coat with a collar appeared. sprinkled with snow. Yes, it was him, but pale and thin, and with a changed, strangely softened, but anxious expression on his face. He entered the stairs and hugged his sister.
- You didn't receive my letter? he asked, and without waiting for an answer, which he would not have received, because the princess could not speak, he returned and with the obstetrician, who came in after him (he had gathered with him at the last station), with quick steps again entered the ladder and hugged his sister again.
- What a fate! he said. - Masha, dear! - And, throwing off his fur coat and boots, he went to the half of the princess.
The little princess lay on the pillows, in a white cap (suffering had just let go of her), black hair curled in strands around her inflamed, sweaty cheeks; her ruddy, lovely mouth, with a sponge covered with black hairs, was open, and she smiled joyfully. Prince Andrei entered the room and stopped in front of her, at the foot of the sofa on which she was lying. Brilliant eyes, looking childishly frightened and agitated, rested on him without changing their expression. “I love you all, I didn’t harm anyone, why am I suffering? Help me,” her expression said. She saw her husband, but did not understand the meaning of his appearance now before her. Prince Andrei walked around the sofa and kissed her on the forehead.
- My darling! he said a word he had never said to her. "God is merciful..." She looked inquiringly, childishly reproachfully at him.
“I expected help from you, and nothing, nothing, and you too!” her eyes said. She was not surprised that he came; she did not understand that he had come. His arrival had nothing to do with her suffering and its relief. The torment began again, and Marya Bogdanovna advised Prince Andrei to leave the room.
The obstetrician entered the room. Prince Andrei went out and, meeting Princess Marya, again approached her. They spoke in whispers, but every minute the conversation fell silent. They waited and listened.
- Allez, mon ami (Go, my friend), - said Princess Mary. Prince Andrei again went to his wife and sat down in the next room, waiting. Some woman came out of her room with a frightened face and was embarrassed when she saw Prince Andrei. He covered his face with his hands and sat there for several minutes. Pathetic, helpless animal moans were heard from behind the door. Prince Andrei got up, went to the door and wanted to open it. Someone was holding the door.
- You can't, you can't! said a frightened voice. He began to walk around the room. The screams ceased, a few more seconds passed. Suddenly a terrible scream - not her scream - she could not scream like that - was heard in the next room. Prince Andrei ran to her door; the cry ceased, but another cry was heard, the cry of a child.
“Why did they bring a child there? thought Prince Andrei for the first second. - Child? What? .. Why is there a child? Or was it a baby?
When he suddenly realized all the joyous meaning of this cry, tears choked him, and, leaning on the window-sill with both hands, he sobbed, sobbing, as children cry. The door opened. The doctor, with his shirt sleeves rolled up, without his coat, pale and with a trembling jaw, left the room. Prince Andrei turned to him, but the doctor looked at him in bewilderment and, without saying a word, passed by. The woman ran out and, seeing Prince Andrei, hesitated on the threshold. He entered his wife's room. She lay dead in the same position in which he had seen her five minutes earlier, and the same expression, in spite of the fixed eyes and the pallor of her cheeks, was on that charming childish timid face with a sponge covered with black hairs.
“I loved you all and did no harm to anyone, and what have you done to me? Oh, what have you done to me?" said her lovely, pitiful dead face. In the corner of the room something small and red grunted and squeaked in Marya Bogdanovna's white, trembling hands.
Two hours later, Prince Andrei with quiet steps entered his father's office. The old man already knew everything. He stood at the very door, and as soon as it opened, the old man silently, with senile, hard hands, like a vise, clasped his son's neck and sobbed like a child.
Three days later, the little princess was buried, and, saying goodbye to her, Prince Andrei ascended the steps of the coffin. And in the coffin was the same face, although with closed eyes. "Oh, what have you done to me?" - it kept saying, and Prince Andrei felt that something had come off in his soul, that he was to blame for a fault that he could not correct and not forget. He couldn't cry. The old man also entered and kissed her wax pen, which lay high and calm on the other, and her face said to him: “Ah, what and why did you do this to me?” And the old man turned away angrily when he saw that face.
Five days later, the young Prince Nikolai Andreevich was baptized. Mammy held the diapers with her chin, while the priest smeared the boy's wrinkled red hands and steps with a goose feather.
The godfather-grandfather, afraid of dropping, shuddering, carried the baby around a crumpled tin font and handed it over to the godmother, Princess Marya. Prince Andrei, trembling with fear lest the child be drowned, sat in another room, waiting for the end of the sacrament. He joyfully looked at the child when his nanny carried him out, and nodded his head approvingly when the nanny informed him that the wax with hairs thrown into the font did not sink, but floated along the font.
(Meeting of Prince Andrei and Pierre Bezukhov in Bogucharovo, which was of great importance for both and largely determined their future path.1807)
In the happiest state of mind, returning from his southern journey, Pierre fulfilled his long-standing intention - to call on his friend Bolkonsky, whom he had not seen for two years.
At the last station, having learned that Prince Andrei was not in the Bald Mountains, but in his new separated estate, Pierre went to him.
Pierre was struck by the modesty of a small, albeit clean, house after those brilliant conditions in which he last saw his friend in Petersburg. He hurriedly entered the still smelling of pine, unplastered little hall and wanted to move on, but Anton ran forward on tiptoe and knocked on the door.
- Well, what is there? came a harsh, unpleasant voice.
“Guest,” answered Anton.
“Ask me to wait,” and a chair was pushed back. Pierre walked quickly to the door and came face to face with the frowning and aged Prince Andrei, who was coming out to him. Pierre hugged him and, raising his glasses, kissed him on the cheeks and looked at him closely.
“I didn’t expect it, I’m very glad,” said Prince Andrei. Pierre did not say anything; he stared at his friend in surprise, not taking his eyes off him. He was struck by the change that had taken place in Prince Andrei. The words were affectionate, there was a smile on the lips and face of Prince Andrei, but his eyes were dead, dead, to which, despite his apparent desire, Prince Andrei could not give a joyful and cheerful sheen. Not that he lost weight, turned pale, his friend matured; but this look and the wrinkle on the forehead, expressing a long concentration on one thing, amazed and alienated Pierre until he got used to them.
When meeting after a long separation, as always happens, the conversation could not be established for a long time; they asked and answered briefly about such things, about which they themselves knew that it was necessary to talk at a long time. Finally, the conversation began to stop little by little on what was previously said in fragments, on questions about the past life, about plans for the future, about Pierre's journey, about his studies, about the war, etc. That concentration and deadness, which Pierre noticed in the eyes of Prince Andrei, now expressed even more strongly in the smile with which he listened to Pierre, especially when Pierre spoke with animation of joy about the past or the future. As if Prince Andrei would have wished, but could not take part in what he was saying. Pierre began to feel that in front of Prince Andrei, enthusiasm, dreams, hopes for happiness and goodness were indecent. He was ashamed to express all his new, Masonic thoughts, especially those renewed and aroused in him by his last journey. He restrained himself, was afraid to be naive; at the same time, he irresistibly wanted to quickly show his friend that he was now completely different, better Pierre than the one who was in Petersburg.
I can't tell you how much I have experienced during this time. I wouldn't recognize myself.
“Yes, we have changed a lot, a lot since then,” said Prince Andrei.
— Well, and you? Pierre asked. — What are your plans?
— Plans? Prince Andrei ironically repeated. - My plans? he repeated, as if surprised at the meaning of such a word. “Yes, you see, I am building, I want to move completely by next year ...
Pierre silently, intently peered into Andrei's aged face.
“No, I’m asking,” said Pierre, but Prince Andrei interrupted him:
“But what can I say about me ... tell me, tell me about your journey, about everything that you did there on your estates?”
Pierre began to talk about what he had done on his estates, trying as much as possible to hide his participation in the improvements made by him. Prince Andrei several times prompted Pierre in advance what he was telling, as if everything that Pierre did was a long-known story, and listened not only not with interest, but even as if ashamed of what Pierre was telling.
Pierre became embarrassed and even hard in the company of his friend. He fell silent.
“Well, my soul,” said Prince Andrei, who, obviously, was also hard and shy with the guest, “I am here in bivouacs, I came only to look. And now I'm going back to my sister. I will introduce you to them. Yes, you seem to know each other,” he said, obviously entertaining the guest with whom he now felt nothing in common. “We will go after dinner. And now you want to see my estate? - They went out and walked until dinner, talking about political news and mutual acquaintances, like people who are not close to each other. With some animation and interest, Prince Andrei spoke only about the new estate and building he was arranging, but even here, in the middle of the conversation, on the stage, when Prince Andrei was describing to Pierre the future location of the house, he suddenly stopped. - However, there is nothing interesting here, let's go to dinner and let's go. - At dinner, the conversation turned to the marriage of Pierre.
“I was very surprised when I heard about this,” said Prince Andrei.
Pierre blushed just as he always blushed at this, and hastily said:
"I'll tell you one day how it all happened." But you know it's all over, and forever.
- Forever and ever? - said Prince Andrew. “Nothing happens forever.
But do you know how it all ended? Have you heard of the duel?
Yes, you went through that too.
“One thing I thank God for is that I didn’t kill this man,” said Pierre.
- From what? - said Prince Andrew. “Killing an evil dog is even very good.
“No, it’s not good to kill a person, it’s unfair ...
- Why is it unfair? repeated Prince Andrew. “What is fair and unfair is not given to people to judge. People have always been mistaken and will be mistaken, and in nothing more than in what they consider just and unjust.
“It’s unfair that there is evil for another person,” said Pierre, feeling with pleasure that for the first time since his arrival, Prince Andrei was animated and began to speak and wanted to express everything that made him what he was now.
- And who told you what evil is for another person? - he asked.
- Evil? Evil? Pierre said. We all know what evil is for ourselves.
“Yes, we know, but I cannot do the evil that I know for myself to another person,” Prince Andrei said, becoming more and more animated, apparently wanting to express to Pierre his new view of things. He spoke French. - Je ne connais dans la vie que maux bien réels: c "est le remord et la maladie. Il n" est de bien que l "absence de ces maux (I know only two real misfortunes in life: remorse and illness. And happiness is only the absence of these two evils.) To live for oneself, avoiding only these two evils, that is all my wisdom now.
What about love of neighbor and self-sacrifice? Pierre spoke up. No, I can't agree with you! To live only in such a way as not to do evil, not to repent, this is not enough. I lived like this, I lived for myself and ruined my life. And only now, when I live, at least I try (Pierre corrected myself out of modesty) to live for others, only now I understand all the happiness of life. No, I don't agree with you, and you don't think what you say either. Prince Andrei silently looked at Pierre and smiled mockingly.
- Here you will see your sister, Princess Marya. You will get along with her,” he said. “Perhaps you are right for yourself,” he continued after a pause, “but everyone lives in his own way: you lived for yourself and you say that by doing so you almost ruined your life, and you only knew happiness when you began to live for others. And I experienced the opposite. I lived for fame. (After all, what is fame? The same love for others, the desire to do something for them, the desire for their praise.) So I lived for others and not almost, but completely ruined my life. And since then I have become calm, as I live for myself alone.
- But how to live for oneself? Pierre asked, getting excited. What about son, sister, father?
“Yes, it’s still the same me, it’s not others,” said Prince Andrei, “but others, neighbors, le prochain, as you and Princess Marya call it, this is the main source of delusion and evil. Le prochain - these are your Kyiv men whom you want to do good.
And he looked at Pierre with a mockingly defiant look. He apparently called Pierre.
“You are joking,” Pierre said more and more animatedly. - What error and evil can be in the fact that I wanted (very little and badly done), but I wanted to do good, and even did something? What evil can it be that unfortunate people, our peasants, people just like us, growing up and dying without another concept of God and truth, like an image and meaningless prayer, will learn in the comforting beliefs of the future life, retribution, rewards, consolations ? What is the evil and delusion in the fact that people die of illness without help, when it is so easy to help them financially, and I will give them a doctor, and a hospital, and a shelter for an old man? And isn’t it a tangible, undoubted blessing that a peasant, a woman with a child do not have days and nights of peace, and I will give them rest and leisure? .. - said Pierre, hurrying and lisping. “And I did it, albeit badly, at least a little, but I did something for this, and you not only won’t disbelieve me that what I did is good, but you won’t disbelieve me that you yourself don’t think so.” . And most importantly, - continued Pierre, - this is what I know, and I know for sure, that the pleasure of doing this good is the only true happiness of life.
“Yes, if you put the question like that, then this is a different matter,” said Prince Andrei. - I build a house, plant a garden, and you are hospitals. Both can serve as a pastime. But what is just, what is good, leave it to the one who knows everything, and not to us, to judge. Well, you want to argue,” he added, “come on. They left the table and sat on the porch that served as a balcony.
“Well, let’s argue,” said Prince Andrei. “You say school,” he continued, bending his finger, “teachings and so on, that is, you want to take him out,” he said, pointing to the peasant who took off his hat and passed them, “out of his animal state and give him moral needs . And it seems to me that the only possible happiness is the happiness of an animal, and you want to deprive him of it. I envy him, and you want to make him me, but without giving him my mind, my feelings, or my means. Another - you say: to facilitate his work. And in my opinion, physical labor for him is the same necessity, the same condition for his existence, as mental labor is for you and for me. You can't stop thinking. I go to bed at three o'clock, thoughts come to me, and I can't fall asleep, I toss and turn, I don't sleep until morning because I think and I can't help but think, how can he not plow, not mow, otherwise he will go to a tavern or will become sick. Just as I will not endure his terrible physical labor, and die in a week, so he will not endure my physical idleness, he will grow fat and die. Third, what else did you say?
Prince Andrei bent his third finger.
- Oh yes. Hospitals, medicines. He has a stroke, he dies, and you bleed him, cure him, he will walk a cripple for ten years, it will be a burden to everyone. Much calmer and easier for him to die. Others will be born, and there are so many of them. If you were sorry that your extra worker was gone - as I look at him, otherwise you want to treat him out of love for him. And he doesn't need it. And besides, what kind of imagination is it that medicine cured someone ... Kill! - So! he said, frowning angrily and turning away from Pierre.
Prince Andrei expressed his thoughts so clearly and distinctly that it was evident that he thought about it more than once, and he spoke willingly and quickly, like a man who had not spoken for a long time. His gaze became the more animated, the more hopeless his judgments were.
“Oh, this is terrible, terrible! Pierre said. “I just don’t understand how you can live with such thoughts. The same moments were found on me, it was recently, in Moscow and dear, but then I sink to such an extent that I do not live, everything is disgusting to me, most importantly, myself. Then I don't eat, I don't wash... well, what about you...
“Why not wash yourself, it’s not clean,” said Prince Andrei. On the contrary, you should try to make your life as pleasant as possible. I live and it’s not my fault, therefore, it’s necessary somehow better, without interfering with anyone, to live to death.
But what motivates you to live? With such thoughts, you will sit still, doing nothing.
“Life doesn’t leave you alone. I would be glad to do nothing, but, on the one hand, the local nobility honored me by being elected leader; I got off hard. They could not understand that I did not have what was needed, that well-known good-natured and preoccupied vulgarity, which is needed for this. Then this house, which had to be built in order to have its own corner where you can be calm. Now the militia.
Why don't you serve in the army?
— After Austerlitz! said Prince Andrew gloomily. - No, I humbly thank you, I promised myself that I would not serve in the active Russian army. And I will not. If Bonaparte were standing here, near Smolensk, threatening the Bald Mountains, then I would not serve in the Russian army. Well, so I told you, - Prince Andrei continued calming down, - now the militia, the father is the commander-in-chief of the third district, and the only way for me to get rid of the service is to be with him.
“So you serve?”
- I serve. He paused a little.
So why are you serving?
- But why. My father is one of the most remarkable people of his age. But he is getting old, and not only is he cruel, but he is too active in nature. He is terrible because of his habit of unlimited power and now this power given by the sovereign to the commander-in-chief over the militia. If I had been two hours late two weeks ago, he would have hanged the recorder in Yukhnov,” said Prince Andrei with a smile. “So I serve because, apart from me, no one has influence on my father, and in some places I will save him from an act from which he would later suffer.
- Ah, so you see!
- Yes, mais ce n "est pas comme vous l" entendez (but not in the way you think), Prince Andrei continued. “I didn’t and don’t want the slightest good for this bastard protocolist who stole some boots from the militias; I would even be very pleased to see him hanged, but I feel sorry for my father, that is, again for myself.
Prince Andrei became more and more animated. His eyes shone feverishly while he tried to prove to Pierre that there had never been a desire for good for his neighbor in his act.
“Well, you want to free the peasants,” he continued. - It is very good; but not for you (I think you didn't spot anyone or send them to Siberia), and even less so for the peasants. If they are beaten, flogged and sent to Siberia, then I think that this does not make them any worse. In Siberia, he leads the same bestial life, and the scars on his body will heal, and he is as happy as he was before. And this is necessary for those people who perish morally, earn themselves remorse, suppress this repentance and become rude because they have the opportunity to execute right and wrong. That's who I feel sorry for and for whom I would like to free the peasants. You may not have seen, but I have seen how good people, brought up in these traditions of unlimited power, become more irritable with age, become cruel, rude, they know it, they cannot restrain themselves, and everyone becomes more and more unhappy.
Prince Andrei said this with such enthusiasm that Pierre involuntarily thought that these thoughts were induced by Andrei by his father. He didn't answer him.
“So that’s who and what you feel sorry for - human dignity, peace of mind, purity, and not their backs and foreheads, which, no matter how you flog, no matter how you shave, they will all remain the same backs and foreheads.
No, no, and a thousand times no! I will never agree with you,” said Pierre.
In the evening, Prince Andrei and Pierre got into a carriage and drove to the Bald Mountains. Prince Andrei, looking at Pierre, occasionally interrupted the silence with speeches that proved that he was in a good mood.
He told him, pointing to the fields, about his economic improvements.
Pierre was gloomy silent, answering in monosyllables, and seemed immersed in his own thoughts.
Pierre thought that Prince Andrei was unhappy, that he was mistaken, that he did not know the true light, and that Pierre should come to his aid, enlighten and raise him. But as soon as Pierre figured out how and what he would say, he had a presentiment that Prince Andrei would drop all his teachings with one word, with one argument, and he was afraid to start, afraid to expose his beloved shrine to the possibility of ridicule.
“No, why do you think,” Pierre suddenly began, lowering his head and assuming the form of a butting bull, “why do you think so? You shouldn't think like that.
— What am I thinking about? Prince Andrei asked with surprise.
- About life, about the purpose of man. It can't be. That's what I thought, and it saved me, you know what? freemasonry. No, you don't smile. Freemasonry is not a religious, not a ritual sect, as I thought, but Freemasonry is the best, the only expression of the best, eternal aspects of humanity. - And he began to explain to Prince Andrei Freemasonry, as he understood it.
He said that Freemasonry is the teaching of Christianity, freed from state and religious shackles; the doctrine of equality, brotherhood and love.
“Only our holy brotherhood has a real meaning in life; everything else is a dream,” said Pierre. - You understand, my friend, that outside this union everything is full of lies and untruth, and I agree with you that there is nothing left for a smart and kind person, as soon as, like you, to live out his life, trying only not to interfere with others. But assimilate our basic convictions, join our brotherhood, give yourself to us, let yourself be led, and now you will feel yourself, as I felt, part of this huge, invisible chain, the beginning of which is hidden in heaven, - said Pierre.
Prince Andrei silently, looking in front of him, listened to Pierre's speech. Several times, not hearing the noise of the carriage, he asked Pierre for unheard words. From the special brilliance that lit up in the eyes of Prince Andrei, and from his silence, Pierre saw that his words were not in vain, that Prince Andrei would not interrupt him and would not laugh at his words.
They drove up to a flooded river, which they had to cross by ferry. While the carriage and horses were being set up, they went to the ferry.
Prince Andrei, leaning on the railing, silently looked along the flood shining from the setting sun.
- Well, what do you think about it? asked Pierre. - Why are you silent?
- What I think? I listened to you. All this is true,” said Prince Andrei. - But you say: join our brotherhood, and we will show you the purpose of life and the purpose of man and the laws that govern the world. But who are we? - people. Why do you all know? Why am I the only one who doesn't see what you see? You see the kingdom of goodness and truth on earth, but I do not see it.
Pierre interrupted him.
Do you believe in a future life? - he asked.
- To the next life? repeated Prince Andrei, but Pierre did not give him time to answer and mistook this repetition for a denial, especially since he knew Prince Andrei's former atheistic convictions.
— You say that you cannot see the realm of goodness and truth on earth. And I did not see him; and it cannot be seen if one looks at our life as the end of everything. On earth, precisely on this earth (Pierre pointed to the field), there is no truth - everything is a lie and evil; but in the world, in the whole world, there is a kingdom of truth, and we are now children of the earth, and forever children of the whole world. Do I not feel in my soul that I am part of this vast, harmonious whole? Do I not feel that I am in this innumerable number of beings in which the deity is manifested - the highest power - as you wish - that I am one link, one step from lower beings to higher ones? If I see, I clearly see this ladder that leads from plant to man, then why should I assume that this ladder, which I do not see the end of below, is lost in plants. Why should I suppose that this ladder breaks with me, and does not lead further and further to higher beings? I feel that not only can I not disappear, just as nothing in the world disappears, but that I will always be and have always been. I feel that besides me, spirits live above me and that there is truth in this world.
“Yes, this is Herder’s teaching,” said Prince Andrei, “but not that, my soul, will convince me, but life and death, that’s what convinces me.” It is convincing that you see a creature dear to you, who is connected with you, before whom you were guilty and hoped to justify yourself (Prince Andrei trembled in his voice and turned away), and suddenly this creature suffers, suffers and ceases to be ... Why? It cannot be that there is no answer! And I believe that he exists ... That's what convinces, that's what convinced me, - said Prince Andrei.
“Well, yes, well, yes,” said Pierre, “isn’t that what I say too!”
- Not. I only say that it is not arguments that convince you of the need for a future life, but when you walk in life hand in hand with a person, and suddenly this person disappears into nowhere, and you yourself stop in front of this abyss and look into it. And I looked...
- Well, so what! Do you know what is there and what is someone? There is a future life. Someone is God.
Prince Andrew did not answer. The carriage and the horses had long been brought to the other side and laid down, and the sun had already disappeared to half and the evening frost covered the puddles near the ferry with stars, and Pierre and Andrei, to the surprise of the lackeys, coachmen and carriers, were still standing on the ferry and talking.
- If there is a God and there is a future life, then there is truth, there is virtue; and the highest happiness of man is to strive to achieve them. We must live, we must love, we must believe, - said Pierre, - that we do not live today only on this piece of land, but we have lived and will live forever there, in everything (he pointed to the sky). - Prince Andrei stood, leaning on the railing of the ferry, and, listening to Pierre, without taking his eyes off, looked at the red reflection of the sun over the blue flood. Pierre is silent. It was completely quiet. The ferry had landed long ago, and only the waves of the current with a faint sound hit the bottom of the ferry. It seemed to Prince Andrei that this rinsing of the waves was saying to Pierre's words: "True, believe this."
Prince Andrei sighed and looked with a radiant, childish, tender look into Pierre's flushed, enthusiastic, but still timid in front of his superior friend.
“Yes, if that were the case!” - he said. “However, let’s go sit down,” Prince Andrei added, and, leaving the ferry, he looked at the sky, which Pierre pointed out to him, and for the first time after Austerlitz he saw that high, eternal sky, which he saw lying on the Austerlitz field, and something long asleep, something better that was in him, suddenly awoke joyfully and youthfully in his soul. This feeling disappeared as soon as Prince Andrei entered the habitual conditions of life again, but he knew that this feeling, which he did not know how to develop, lived in him. A meeting with Pierre was for Prince Andrei an epoch from which, although in appearance it was the same, but in the inner world, his new life began.
(The life of Prince Andrei in the countryside, transformations in his estates. 1807-1809)
Prince Andrei lived without a break for two years in the countryside. All those enterprises on estates that Pierre started at home and did not bring to any result, constantly moving from one thing to another, all these enterprises, without expressing them to anyone and without noticeable labor, were carried out by Prince Andrei.
He had in the highest degree that practical tenacity that Pierre lacked, which, without scope and effort on his part, gave movement to the cause.
One of his estates of three hundred souls of peasants was listed as free cultivators (this was one of the first examples in Russia), in others corvée was replaced by dues. In Bogucharovo, a learned grandmother was issued to his account to help women in childbirth, and the priest taught the children of peasants and yards to read and write for a salary.
One half of his time, Prince Andrei spent in the Bald Mountains with his father and son, who was still with the nannies; the other half of the time in the Bogucharovo monastery, as his father called his village. Despite the indifference he showed to Pierre to all the external events of the world, he diligently followed them, received many books and, to his surprise, noticed when fresh people from Petersburg, from the very whirlpool of life, came to him or to his father, that these people in knowledge of everything that happens in foreign and domestic policy, they are far behind him, who is sitting without a break in the countryside.
In addition to classes on estates, in addition to general studies in reading a wide variety of books, Prince Andrei was at that time engaged in a critical analysis of our last two unfortunate campaigns and drawing up a project to change our military regulations and decrees.
(Description of an old oak tree)
There was an oak at the edge of the road. Probably ten times older than the birches that made up the forest, it was ten times thicker and twice as tall as each birch. It was a huge oak tree in two girths with broken branches, which can be seen for a long time, and with broken bark, overgrown with old sores. With his huge clumsy, asymmetrically spread, clumsy hands and fingers, he stood between the smiling birches, an old, angry and contemptuous freak. Only he alone did not want to submit to the charm of spring and did not want to see either spring or the sun.
"Spring, and love, and happiness!" - this oak seemed to be saying, - “and how you don’t get tired of all the same stupid and senseless deceit. Everything is the same, and everything is a lie! There is no spring, no sun, no happiness. Look over there, crushed dead fir trees are sitting, always the same, and there I spread my broken, peeled fingers, wherever they grew - from the back, from the sides; as I grew up, so I stand, and I do not believe your hopes and deceptions.
Prince Andrei looked back at this oak tree several times as he rode through the forest, as if he was expecting something from him. There were flowers and grass under the oak, but he still, frowning, motionless, ugly and stubbornly, stood in the middle of them.
“Yes, he is right, this oak is a thousand times right,” thought Prince Andrei, let others, young ones, again succumb to this deception, and we know life, our life is over! A whole new series of thoughts, hopeless, but sadly pleasant in connection with this oak, arose in the soul of Prince Andrei. During this journey, it was as if he thought over his whole life again, and came to the same calming and hopeless conclusion that he had no need to start anything, that he should live his life without doing evil, without worrying and desiring nothing.
(Spring 1809 Bolkonsky's business trip to Otradnoye to Count Rostov. First meeting with Natasha)
On guardian affairs of the Ryazan estate, Prince Andrei had to see the district marshal. The leader was Count Ilya Andreyevich Rostov, and Prince Andrei went to him in mid-May.
It was already a hot spring. The forest was already all dressed up, there was dust and it was so hot that, passing by the water, I wanted to swim.
Prince Andrei, gloomy and preoccupied with thoughts about what and what he needs to ask the leader about business, drove up along the alley of the garden to the Rostovs' Otradnensky house. To the right, from behind the trees, he heard a woman's cheerful cry and saw a crowd of girls running across his carriage. Ahead of the others, closer, a black-haired, very thin, strangely thin, black-eyed girl in a yellow cotton dress, tied with a white handkerchief, from under which strands of combed hair were knocked out, ran up to the carriage. The girl was shouting something, but, recognizing the stranger, without looking at him, she ran back with a laugh.
Prince Andrei suddenly felt sick for some reason. The day was so good, the sun so bright, everything around was so cheerful; but this thin and pretty girl did not know and did not want to know about his existence and was pleased and happy with some kind of her own separate - it’s true, stupid - but cheerful and happy life. “Why is she so happy? What is she thinking? Not about the military charter, not about the arrangement of the Ryazan dues. What is she thinking? And why is she happy? Prince Andrei involuntarily asked himself with curiosity.
Count Ilya Andreevich in 1809 lived in Otradnoye just as before, that is, taking over almost the entire province, with hunts, theaters, dinners and musicians. He, like any new guest, was once to Prince Andrei and almost forcibly left him to spend the night.
In the course of a boring day, during which Prince Andrei was occupied by the senior hosts and the most honored of the guests, with whom, on the occasion of the approaching name day, the house of the old count was full, Bolkonsky, looking several times at Natasha, who was laughing at something, having fun among the other, young half of society, everyone asked himself: “What is she thinking about? Why is she so happy?
In the evening, left alone in a new place, he could not sleep for a long time. He read, then put out the candle and lit it again. It was hot in the room with the shutters closed from the inside. He was annoyed with this stupid old man (as he called Rostov), who had detained him, assuring him that the necessary papers in the city had not yet been delivered, he was annoyed with himself for having stayed.
Prince Andrei got up and went to the window to open it. As soon as he opened the shutters, the moonlight, as if he had been waiting for it at the window for a long time, burst into the room. He opened the window. The night was fresh and still-light. Right in front of the window was a row of trimmed trees, black on one side and silvery on the other. Under the trees there was some kind of juicy, wet, curly vegetation with silvery leaves and stems here and there. Further behind the black trees there was a roof of some sort glistening with dew, to the right a large curly tree with a bright white trunk and branches, and above it an almost full moon in a bright, almost starless spring sky. Prince Andrei leaned against the window, and his eyes rested on this sky.
Prince Andrei's room was on the middle floor; they also lived in the rooms above it and did not sleep. He heard a woman speak from above.
“Just one more time,” said a female voice from above, which Prince Andrei now recognized.
- When are you going to sleep? answered another voice.
“I won’t, I can’t sleep, what should I do!” Well, the last time...
- Oh, what a delight! Well, now sleep, and the end.
“Sleep, but I can’t,” answered the first voice, approaching the window. She must have leaned out of the window completely, because the rustle of her dress and even her breathing could be heard. Everything was quiet and petrified, like the moon and its light and shadows. Prince Andrei was also afraid to move, so as not to betray his involuntary presence.
Sonya reluctantly answered something.
— No, look at that moon!.. Oh, what a charm! You come here. Darling, dove, come here. Well, see? So I would squat down like this, grab myself under my knees - tighter, as tight as possible, you have to strain - and fly. Like this!
- All right, you're going to fall.
- It's the second hour.
Oh, you're just ruining everything for me. Well, go, go.
Everything fell silent again, but Prince Andrei knew that she was still sitting there, he sometimes heard a quiet stir, sometimes sighs.
- Oh my god! My God! What is it! she suddenly cried out. — Sleep so sleep! and slammed the window.
“And it doesn’t matter to my existence!” thought Prince Andrei while he listened to her talk, for some reason expecting and fearing that she would say something about him. “And again she! And how on purpose! he thought. Such an unexpected confusion of young thoughts and hopes, which contradicted his whole life, suddenly arose in his soul, that he, feeling unable to understand his state of mind, immediately fell asleep.
(Renewed old oak. Bolkonsky's thoughts that life is not over at 31)
The next day, having said goodbye to only one count, without waiting for the ladies to leave, Prince Andrei went home.
It was already the beginning of June, when Prince Andrei, returning home, drove again into that birch grove in which this old, gnarled oak struck him so strangely and memorable. The bells rang even more muffled in the forest than a month ago; everything was full, shady and dense; and young spruce trees scattered throughout the forest did not disturb the general beauty and, imitation of the general character, tenderly turned green with fluffy young shoots.
The whole day was hot, a thunderstorm was gathering somewhere, but only a small cloud splashed on the dust of the road and on the succulent leaves. The left side of the forest was dark, in shadow; the right one, wet, glossy, shone in the sun, slightly swaying in the wind. Everything was in bloom; the nightingales chirped and rolled now close, now far away.
“Yes, here, in this forest, there was this oak, with which we agreed,” thought Prince Andrei. — Where is he? ” thought Prince Andrei again, looking at the left side of the road and, without knowing it himself, without recognizing him, admired the oak he was looking for. The old oak, all transformed, spread out like a tent of juicy, dark greenery, was thrilled, slightly swaying in the rays of the evening sun. No clumsy fingers, no sores, no old grief and distrust - nothing was visible. Juicy, young leaves broke through the hundred-year-old hard bark without knots, so that it was impossible to believe that the old man had produced them. “Yes, this is the same oak,” thought Prince Andrei, and a causeless spring feeling of joy and renewal suddenly came over him. All the best moments of his life were suddenly remembered to him at the same time. And Austerlitz with a high sky, and the dead, reproachful face of his wife, and Pierre on the ferry, and the girl, excited by the beauty of the night, and this night, and the moon - and he suddenly remembered all this.
“No, life is not over even for thirty-one years,” Prince Andrei suddenly decided without change. - Not only do I know everything that is in me, it is necessary that everyone knows this: both Pierre and this girl who wanted to fly into the sky, it is necessary that everyone knows me, so that my life goes not for me alone. life, so that they do not live like this girl, regardless of my life, so that it is reflected in everyone and so that they all live with me together!
Returning from his trip, Prince Andrei decided to go to Petersburg in the fall and came up with various reasons for this decision. A whole series of reasonable, logical arguments why he needed to go to Petersburg and even serve, was every minute ready for his services. Even now he did not understand how he could ever doubt the need to take an active part in life, just as a month ago he did not understand how the idea of leaving the village could come to him. It seemed clear to him that all his experiences in life must have been lost in vain and be nonsense if he had not put them to work and had not again taken an active part in life. He did not even understand how, on the basis of the same poor rational arguments, it had previously been obvious that he would be humiliated if now, after his lessons in life, he would again believe in the possibility of being useful and in the possibility of happiness and love. Now my mind was telling me something else. After this trip, Prince Andrei began to get bored in the countryside, his previous activities did not interest him, and often, sitting alone in his office, he got up, went to the mirror and looked at his face for a long time. Then he turned away and looked at the portrait of the deceased Lisa, who, with curls whipped a la grecque, tenderly and cheerfully looked at him from a golden frame. She no longer spoke the former terrible words to her husband, she simply and cheerfully looked at him with curiosity. And Prince Andrei, with his hands folded back, paced the room for a long time, now frowning, now smiling, rethinking those unreasonable, inexpressible in words, secret as a crime thoughts connected with Pierre, with fame, with the girl at the window, with the oak, with female beauty and love that changed his whole life. And at those moments, when someone came to him, he was especially dry, sternly resolute, and especially unpleasantly logical.
(Prince Andrei arrives in St. Petersburg. Bolkonsky's reputation in society)
Prince Andrei was in one of the most favorable positions in order to be well received in all the most diverse and highest circles of the then Petersburg society. The party of reformers cordially received and lured him, firstly, because he had a reputation for intelligence and great erudition, and secondly, because by setting the peasants free he had already made himself a reputation as a liberal. The party of old dissatisfied, just like the son of their father, turned to him for sympathy, condemning the transformation. The society of women, the world, welcomed him cordially, because he was a bridegroom, rich and noble, and almost a new face with a halo of a romantic story about his imaginary death and the tragic death of his wife. In addition, the general voice about him of all who knew him before was that he changed a lot for the better in these five years, softened and matured, that there was no former pretense, pride and mockery in him, and there was that calmness that is acquired for years. They started talking about him, they were interested in him, and everyone wanted to see him.
(Relation of Bolkonsky to Speransky)
Speransky, both on the first meeting with him at Kochubey’s, and then in the middle of the house, where Speransky, privately, having received Bolkonsky, spoke with him for a long time and trustingly, made a strong impression on Prince Andrei.
Prince Andrei considered such a huge number of people to be contemptible and insignificant creatures, he so wanted to find in another a living ideal of that perfection to which he aspired, that he easily believed that in Speransky he found this ideal of a completely reasonable and virtuous person. If Speransky had been from the same society from which Prince Andrei was, of the same upbringing and moral habits, then Bolkonsky would soon have found his weak, human, non-heroic sides, but now this logical mindset, strange to him, inspired him all the more respect that he did not quite understand it. In addition, Speransky, whether because he appreciated the abilities of Prince Andrei, or because he found it necessary to acquire him for himself, Speransky flirted with Prince Andrei with his impartial, calm mind and flattered Prince Andrei with that subtle flattery, combined with arrogance, which consists in tacit recognition of his interlocutor with himself as the only person capable of understanding all the stupidity of everyone else, the rationality and depth of his thoughts.
During their long conversation on Wednesday evening, Speransky said more than once: “We look at everything that comes out of the general level of an inveterate habit ...” - or with a smile: “But we want the wolves to be fed and the sheep safe. ..” - or: “They cannot understand this ...” - and all with such an expression that said: “We, you and I, we understand what they are and who we are.”
This first long conversation with Speransky only strengthened in Prince Andrei the feeling with which he saw Speransky for the first time. He saw in him a reasonable, strict-thinking, huge mind of a man who had achieved power with energy and perseverance and was using it only for the good of Russia. Speransky, in the eyes of Prince Andrei, was precisely that person who rationally explains all the phenomena of life, recognizes as valid only that which is reasonable, and knows how to apply the measure of rationality to everything, which he himself so wanted to be. Everything seemed so simple, clear in Speransky's presentation that Prince Andrei involuntarily agreed with him in everything. If he objected and argued, it was only because he wanted on purpose to be independent and not completely obey the opinions of Speransky. Everything was like that, everything was fine, but one thing confused Prince Andrei: it was Speransky’s cold, mirror-like look, not letting in his soul, and his white, tender hand, which Prince Andrei involuntarily looked at, as they usually look at people’s hands, having power. For some reason, this mirror look and this gentle hand irritated Prince Andrei. Unpleasantly, Prince Andrei was also struck by the too great contempt for people that he noticed in Speransky, and the variety of methods in the evidence that he cited in support of his opinion. He used all possible tools of thought, excluding comparisons, and too boldly, as it seemed to Prince Andrei, he moved from one to another. Now he took the ground of a practical figure and condemned the dreamers, then he took the ground of a satirist and ironically laughed at his opponents, then he became strictly logical, then he suddenly rose into the realm of metaphysics. (He used this last instrument of proof with particular frequency.) He carried the question to metaphysical heights, passed into the definitions of space, time, thought, and, bringing refutations from there, again descended to the ground of the dispute.
In general, the main feature of Speransky's mind, which struck Prince Andrei, was an undoubted, unshakable faith in the strength and legitimacy of the mind. It was evident that Speransky had never been able to come up with the idea, common to Prince Andrei, that it is still impossible to express everything that you think, and the doubt never came that everything that I think was not nonsense, and everything I believe in? And this particular mindset of Speransky most of all attracted Prince Andrei to himself.
At the first time of his acquaintance with Speransky, Prince Andrei had a passionate feeling of admiration for him, similar to the one he once felt for Bonaparte. The fact that Speransky was the son of a priest, whom stupid people could, as many did, began to be despised as a goofball and priest, forced Prince Andrei to be especially careful with his feeling for Speransky and unconsciously strengthen it in himself.
On that first evening that Bolkonsky spent with him, talking about the commission for drafting laws, Speransky ironically told Prince Andrei that the commission of laws had existed for a hundred and fifty years, cost millions and had done nothing, that Rosenkampf had pasted labels on all articles of comparative legislation .
- And that's all for which the state paid millions! - he said. “We want to give a new judiciary to the Senate, but we don't have laws. That is why it is a sin not to serve people like you, prince.
Prince Andrei said that this required a legal education, which he did not have.
- Yes, no one has it, so what do you want? It is a circulus viciosus (vicious circle) from which one must force oneself out.
A week later, Prince Andrei was a member of the commission for drafting the military regulations and, which he did not expect, the head of the department of the commission for drafting laws. At the request of Speransky, he took the first part of the civil code being compiled and, with the help of the Code Napoléon and Justiniani (the Napoleonic Code and the Code of Justinian), worked on compiling the department: Rights of Persons.
(December 31, 1809 Ball at the Catherine's nobleman. New meeting of Bolkonsky and Natasha Rostova)
Natasha looked with joy at the familiar face of Pierre, that pea jester, as Peronskaya called him, and knew that Pierre was looking for them, and especially for her, in the crowd. Pierre promised her to be at the ball and introduce her to the gentlemen.
But, before reaching them, Bezukhov stopped beside a short, very handsome brunette in a white uniform, who, standing at the window, was talking to some tall man in stars and a ribbon. Natasha immediately recognized a short young man in a white uniform: it was Bolkonsky, who seemed to her very rejuvenated, cheerful and prettier.
- Here's another friend, Bolkonsky, see, mom? said Natasha, pointing to Prince Andrei. - Remember, he spent the night with us in Otradnoye.
— Oh, you know him? Peronskaya said. - I can not stand. Il fait à présent la pluie et le beau temps (Everyone is crazy about him now.). And pride is such that there are no boundaries! I followed papa. And I contacted Speransky, some projects are being written. See how the ladies are treated! She is talking to him, but he turned away,” she said, pointing to him. “I would beat him up if he did the same to me as he did to these ladies.”
Prince Andrei, in his colonel's white uniform (for cavalry), in stockings and boots, lively and cheerful, stood in the forefront of the circle, not far from the Rostovs. Baron Firgof spoke to him about tomorrow, the proposed first meeting of the State Council. Prince Andrei, as a person close to Speransky and participating in the work of the legislative commission, could give correct information about the meeting of tomorrow, about which there were various rumors. But he did not listen to what Firgof told him, and looked first at the sovereign, then at the gentlemen who were about to dance, who did not dare to enter the circle.
Prince Andrei watched these cavaliers and ladies, timid in the presence of the sovereign, dying from the desire to be invited.
Pierre went up to Prince Andrei and grabbed his hand.
You are always dancing. There is my protégée here, the young Rostova, invite her,” he said.
- Where? Bolkonsky asked. “I’m sorry,” he said, turning to the baron, “we’ll finish this conversation in another place, but at the ball you have to dance.” - He stepped forward, in the direction that Pierre indicated to him. Natasha's desperate, fading face caught Prince Andrei's eyes. He recognized her, guessed her feelings, realized that she was a beginner, remembered her conversation at the window, and with a cheerful expression approached Countess Rostova.
"Let me introduce you to my daughter," said the countess, blushing.
“I have the pleasure of being acquainted, if the countess remembers me,” said Prince Andrei with a courteous and low bow, completely contradicting Peronskaya’s remarks about his rudeness, going up to Natasha and raising his hand to hug her waist even before he finished the invitation to dance . He offered her a waltz tour. That fading expression on Natasha's face, ready for despair and delight, suddenly lit up with a happy, grateful, childlike smile.
“I have been waiting for you for a long time,” this frightened and happy girl seemed to say with her smile that shone from ready tears, raising her hand on Prince Andrei’s shoulder. They were the second couple to enter the circle. Prince Andrei was one of the best dancers of his time. Natasha danced superbly. Her feet in ballroom satin shoes quickly, easily and independently of her did their job, and her face shone with the delight of happiness. Her bare neck and arms were thin and ugly in comparison to Helen's shoulders. Her shoulders were thin, her chest indefinite, her arms thin; but Helen already seemed to have varnish from all the thousands of glances that glided over her body, and Natasha seemed like a girl who was naked for the first time and who would be very ashamed of it if she had not been assured that it was so necessary.
Prince Andrei loved to dance and, wanting to quickly get rid of the political and intelligent conversations with which everyone turned to him, and wanting to quickly break this annoying circle of embarrassment formed by the presence of the sovereign, he went to dance and chose Natasha, because Pierre pointed her out to him. and because she was the first of the pretty women that caught his eye; but as soon as he embraced this thin, mobile, quivering figure and she stirred so close to him and smiled so close to him, the wine of her charms hit his head: he felt revived and rejuvenated when, catching his breath and leaving her, he stopped and began to look at the dancers.
After Prince Andrei, Boris approached Natasha, inviting her to dance, and that adjutant dancer who started the ball, and still young people, and Natasha, passing her excess gentlemen to Sonya, happy and flushed, did not stop dancing the whole evening. She did not notice and did not see anything that occupied everyone at this ball. She not only did not notice how the sovereign spoke for a long time with the French envoy, how he spoke especially graciously with such and such a lady, how the prince did such and such and said such and such, how Helen had great success and received special attention such and such; she did not even see the sovereign and noticed that he had left only because after his departure the ball became more lively. One of the merry cotillions, before supper, Prince Andrei again danced with Natasha. He reminded her of their first date in Otradnenskaya Alley and how she could not fall asleep on a moonlit night and how he could not help hearing her. Natasha blushed at this reminder and tried to justify herself, as if there was something shameful in the feeling in which Prince Andrei involuntarily overheard her.
Prince Andrei, like all people who grew up in the world, loved to meet in the world that which did not have a common secular imprint. And such was Natasha, with her surprise, joy, and timidity, and even mistakes in French. He spoke with her especially tenderly and carefully. Sitting beside her, talking to her about the simplest and most insignificant subjects, Prince Andrei admired the joyful gleam in her eyes and smile, which was related not to spoken speeches, but to her inner happiness. While Natasha was chosen and she got up with a smile and danced around the hall, Prince Andrei admired in particular her timid grace. In the middle of the cotillion, Natasha, having finished the figure, still breathing heavily, approached her place. The new gentleman again invited her. She was tired and out of breath, and apparently thought of refusing, but immediately again cheerfully raised her hand on the cavalier's shoulder and smiled at Prince Andrei.
“I would be glad to rest and sit with you, I am tired; but you see how they choose me, and I'm glad about it, and I'm happy, and I love everyone, and you and I understand all this, ”and that smile said a lot more, a lot more. When the gentleman left her, Natasha ran across the hall to take two ladies for the pieces.
“If she comes first to her cousin, and then to another lady, then she will be my wife,” Prince Andrei said quite unexpectedly to himself, looking at her. She went first to her cousin.
“What nonsense sometimes comes to mind! thought Prince Andrew. “But it’s only true that this girl is so sweet, so special, that she won’t dance here for a month and get married ... This is a rarity here,” he thought, when Natasha, straightening the rose that had fallen back from her corsage, sat down beside him.
At the end of the cotillion, the old count in his blue tailcoat approached the dancers. He invited Prince Andrei to his place and asked his daughter if she was having fun? Natasha did not answer and only smiled with such a smile that said reproachfully: “How could you ask about this?”
- So much fun, like never before in my life! she said, and Prince Andrei noticed how quickly her thin hands rose to hug her father, and immediately fell down. Natasha was as happy as ever in her life. She was at that highest level of happiness when a person becomes completely kind and good and does not believe in the possibility of evil, misfortune and grief.
(Bolkonsky visiting the Rostovs. New feelings and new plans for the future)
Prince Andrei felt in Natasha the presence of a completely alien to him, a special world, full of some joys unknown to him, that alien world that even then, in Otradnenskaya alley and at the window on a moonlit night, teased him so much. Now this world no longer teased him, there was no alien world; but he himself, entering into it, found in it a new pleasure for himself.
After dinner, Natasha, at the request of Prince Andrei, went to the clavichord and began to sing. Prince Andrei stood at the window, talking to the ladies, and listened to her. In the middle of a sentence, Prince Andrei fell silent and suddenly felt tears rising to his throat, the possibility of which he did not know behind him. He looked at the singing Natasha, and something new and happy happened in his soul. He was happy and at the same time sad. He had absolutely nothing to cry about, but was he ready to cry? About what? About old love? About the little princess? About your disappointments?.. About your hopes for the future? Yes and no. The main thing he wanted to cry about was the terrible contrast he suddenly realized vividly between something infinitely great and indefinable that was in him, and something narrow and corporeal that he himself was and even she was. This contrast tormented and delighted him during her singing.
Prince Andrei left the Rostovs late in the evening. He went to bed out of the habit of going to bed, but soon saw that he could not sleep. Lighting a candle, he sat in bed, then got up, then lay down again, not in the least burdened by insomnia: he felt so joyful and new in his soul, as if he had stepped out of a stuffy room into the free light of God. It never occurred to him that he was in love with Rostov; he did not think of her; he only imagined it to himself, and as a result of this his whole life appeared to him in a new light. “What am I struggling with, what am I fussing about in this narrow, closed frame, when life, all life with all its joys is open to me?” he said to himself. And for the first time after a long time he began to make happy plans for the future. He decided by himself that he needed to take up the education of his son, finding him an educator and instructing him; then you have to retire and go abroad, see England, Switzerland, Italy. “I need to use my freedom while I feel so much strength and youth in myself,” he said to himself. - Pierre was right when he said that one must believe in the possibility of happiness in order to be happy, and now I believe in him. Let's leave the dead to bury the dead, but as long as you're alive, you have to live and be happy," he thought.
(Bolkonsky tells Pierre about his love for Natasha Rostova)
Prince Andrei, with a radiant, enthusiastic face renewed to life, stopped in front of Pierre and, not noticing his sad face, smiled at him with egoism of happiness.
“Well, my soul,” he said, “yesterday I wanted to tell you and today I came to you for this. Never experienced anything like it. I'm in love my friend.
Pierre suddenly sighed heavily and sank down with his heavy body on the sofa next to Prince Andrei.
- To Natasha Rostov, right? - he said.
- Yes, yes, in whom? I would never believe it, but this feeling is stronger than me. Yesterday I suffered, suffered, but I will not give up this torment for anything in the world. I haven't lived before. Now only I live, but I can't live without her. But can she love me?.. I'm too old for her... What don't you say?..
- I? I? What did I tell you, - Pierre suddenly said, getting up and starting to walk around the room. "I've always thought that... This girl is such a treasure, such... She's a rare girl... Dear friend, I beg you, don't think, don't hesitate, get married, get married, get married... And I'm sure that no one will be happier than you.
- But she?
- She loves you.
“Don’t talk nonsense ...” said Prince Andrei, smiling and looking into Pierre’s eyes.
“He loves, I know,” Pierre shouted angrily.
“No, listen,” said Prince Andrei, stopping him by the hand.
Do you know what position I'm in? I need to tell everything to someone.
“Well, well, say, I’m very glad,” Pierre said, and indeed his face changed, the wrinkle smoothed out, and he joyfully listened to Prince Andrei. Prince Andrei seemed and was a completely different, new person. Where was his anguish, his contempt for life, his disappointment? Pierre was the only person before whom he dared to speak out; but for that he already expressed to him everything that was in his soul. Either he easily and boldly made plans for a long future, talked about how he could not sacrifice his happiness for the whim of his father, how he would force his father to agree to this marriage and love her or do without his consent, then he was surprised how on something strange, alien, not dependent on him, on the feeling that possessed him.
“I would not believe someone who would tell me that I can love like that,” said Prince Andrei. “It's not the same feeling I had before. The whole world is divided for me into two halves: one is she, and there is all happiness, hope, light; the other half is all where it is not, there is all despondency and darkness...
“Darkness and gloom,” repeated Pierre, “yes, yes, I understand that.
“I can't help but love the light, it's not my fault. And I am very happy. You understand me? I know that you are happy for me.
“Yes, yes,” Pierre confirmed, looking at his friend with touching and sad eyes. The brighter the fate of Prince Andrei seemed to him, the darker his own seemed.
(Relations between Andrei Bolkonsky and Natasha Rostova after a marriage proposal)
There was no betrothal, and no one was announced about Bolkonsky's engagement to Natasha; Prince Andrew insisted on this. He said that since he was the cause of the delay, he must bear the full burden of it. He said that he had forever bound himself with his word, but that he did not want to bind Natasha and gave her complete freedom. If in six months she feels that she does not love him, she will be in her own right if she refuses him. It goes without saying that neither the parents nor Natasha wanted to hear about it; but Prince Andrei insisted on his own. Prince Andrei visited the Rostovs every day, but not like a groom treated Natasha: he told her you and only kissed her hand. Between Prince Andrei and Natasha, after the day of the proposal, completely different than before, close, simple relations were established. They didn't seem to know each other until now. Both he and she loved to remember how they looked at each other when they were still nothing, now they both felt like completely different beings: then pretended, now simple and sincere.
The old count sometimes approached Prince Andrei, kissed him, asked him for advice on the upbringing of Petya or the service of Nikolai. The old countess sighed as she looked at them. Sonya was afraid at any moment to be superfluous and tried to find excuses to leave them alone when they did not need it. When Prince Andrei spoke (he spoke very well), Natasha listened to him with pride; when she spoke, she noticed with fear and joy that he was looking at her attentively and searchingly. She asked herself in bewilderment: "What is he looking for in me? Is he achieving something with his look! What if there is not in me what he is looking for with this look?" Sometimes she entered into her insanely cheerful mood, and then she especially liked to listen and watch how Prince Andrei laughed. He rarely laughed, but when he did, he gave himself over to his laughter, and every time after that laughter she felt closer to him. Natasha would have been perfectly happy if the thought of the upcoming and approaching parting had not frightened her, since he, too, turned pale and cold at the mere thought of it.
(From a letter from Princess Marya to Julie Karagina)
“Our family life goes on as before, with the exception of the presence of brother Andrei. He, as I wrote to you, has changed a lot lately. After his grief, only now, this year, he completely morally revived. He became the way I knew him as a child: kind, gentle, with that golden heart, to which I know no equal. He realized, it seems to me, that life is not over for him. But along with this moral change, he became very physically weak. He became thinner than before, more nervous. I fear for him and am glad that he has undertaken this trip abroad, which the doctors have long prescribed for him. I hope this fixes it. You write to me that in Petersburg they talk about him as one of the most active, educated and intelligent young people. Forgive the pride of kinship - I never doubted it. It is impossible to count the good that he did here to everyone, from his peasants to the nobles. Arriving in Petersburg, he took only what he was supposed to.
(The conversation between Bolkonsky and Bezukhov about Natasha Rostova after the incident with Prince Kuragin. Andrey cannot forgive Natasha)
“Forgive me if I bother you ...” Pierre realized that Prince Andrei wanted to talk about Natasha, and his broad face expressed regret and sympathy. This expression on Pierre's face annoyed Prince Andrei; he continued resolutely, sonorously and unpleasantly: “I received a refusal from Countess Rostova, and rumors reached me about your brother-in-law seeking her hand or something like that. Is it true?
“Both true and false,” began Pierre; but Prince Andrei interrupted him.
“Here are her letters,” he said, “and her portrait. He took the bundle from the table and handed it to Pierre.
"Give it to the Countess... if you see her."
“She is very ill,” said Pierre.
"So she's still here?" - said Prince Andrew. “And Prince Kuragin?” he asked quickly.
“He left a long time ago. She was dying...
“I am very sorry about her illness,” said Prince Andrei. He coldly, evilly, unpleasantly, like his father, chuckled.
- But Mr. Kuragin, therefore, did not honor Countess Rostov with his hand? Andrey said. He snorted several times.
"He couldn't get married because he was married," said Pierre.
Prince Andrei laughed unpleasantly, again reminding himself of his father.
“Where is he now, your brother-in-law, may I ask?” - he said.
“He went to Peter ... however, I don’t know,” said Pierre.
“Well, it doesn’t matter,” said Prince Andrei. - Tell Countess Rostova that she was and is completely free and that I wish her all the best.
Pierre picked up a bundle of papers. Prince Andrei, as if remembering whether he needed to say something else, or waiting for Pierre to say something, looked at him with a fixed look.
“Listen, you remember our dispute in Petersburg,” said Pierre, “remember about ...
“I remember,” Prince Andrei hastily answered, “I said that a fallen woman must be forgiven, but I did not say that I could forgive. I cant.
- How can you compare it? .. - said Pierre. Prince Andrew interrupted him. He shouted sharply:
“Yes, to ask for her hand again, to be generous and the like? .. Yes, this is very noble, but I am not able to follow sur les brisées de monsieur (in the footsteps of this gentleman). If you want to be my friend, don't ever talk to me about this... about all this. Well, goodbye.
(Conversation of Bolkonsky and Bezukhov about the war, victory and loss in battle)
Pierre looked at him in surprise.
“However,” he said, “they say that war is like a game of chess.
“Yes,” said Prince Andrei, “with the only slight difference that in chess you can think as much as you like about each step, that you are there outside the conditions of time, and with the difference that a knight is always stronger than a pawn and two pawns are always stronger.” one, and in war one battalion is sometimes stronger than a division, and sometimes weaker than a company. The relative strength of the troops cannot be known to anyone. Believe me,” he said, “that if anything depended on the orders of the headquarters, then I would be there and make orders, but instead I have the honor to serve here, in the regiment, with these gentlemen, and I think that from us indeed, tomorrow will depend, and not on them ... Success has never depended and will not depend either on position, or on weapons, or even on numbers; and least of all from the position.
- And from what?
“From the feeling that is in me, in him,” he pointed to Timokhin, “in every soldier.
The battle will be won by those who are determined to win it. Why did we lose the battle near Austerlitz? Our loss was almost equal to that of the French, but we told ourselves very early that we had lost the battle, and we did. And we said this because we had no reason to fight there: we wanted to leave the battlefield as soon as possible. "We lost - well, run away!" - we ran. If we had not said this until the evening, God knows what would have happened.
(Andrey Bolkonsky's opinion about the war in a conversation with Pierre Bezukhov on the eve of the Battle of Borodino)
War is not a courtesy, but the most disgusting thing in life, and one must understand this and not play war. This terrible necessity must be taken strictly and seriously. It's all about this: put aside lies, and war is war, not a toy. Otherwise, war is the favorite pastime of idle and frivolous people ... The military class is the most honorable. And what is war, what is needed for success in military affairs, what are the morals of a military society? The purpose of war is murder, the weapons of war are espionage, treason and encouragement, the ruin of the inhabitants, robbing them or stealing food for the army; deceit and lies, called stratagems; the mores of the military class - lack of freedom, that is, discipline, idleness, ignorance, cruelty, depravity, drunkenness. And despite that - this is the highest class, revered by all. All kings, except for the Chinese, wear a military uniform, and the one who killed the most people is given a big reward ... They will come together, like tomorrow, to kill each other, kill, maim tens of thousands of people, and then they will serve thanksgiving prayers for that many people have been beaten (whose number is still being added), and they proclaim victory, believing that the more people are beaten, the greater the merit.
(About love and compassion)
In the unfortunate, sobbing, exhausted man, whose leg had just been taken away, he recognized Anatole Kuragin. They held Anatole in their arms and offered him water in a glass, the rim of which he could not catch with his trembling, swollen lips. Anatole sobbed heavily. “Yes, it is; yes, this man is somehow closely and heavily connected with me, thought Prince Andrei, not yet clearly understanding what was before him. “What is the connection of this person with my childhood, with my life?” he asked himself, finding no answer. And suddenly a new, unexpected memory from the world of childhood, pure and loving, presented itself to Prince Andrei. He remembered Natasha as he had seen her for the first time at the ball of 1810, with a thin neck and thin arms, with a frightened, happy face ready for delight, and love and tenderness for her, even more alive and stronger than ever. woke up in his soul. He remembered now this connection that existed between him and this man, through the tears that filled his swollen eyes, looking at him dully. Prince Andrei remembered everything, and enthusiastic pity and love for this man filled his happy heart.
Prince Andrei could no longer restrain himself and wept tender, loving tears over people, over himself and over their and his own delusions.
“Compassion, love for brothers, for those who love, love for those who hate us, love for enemies - yes, that love that God preached on earth, which Princess Mary taught me and which I did not understand; that's why I felt sorry for life, that's what was left for me, if I were alive. But now it's too late. I know it!"
(About happiness)
“Yes, I discovered a new happiness, inalienable from a person.<…>Happiness that is outside the material forces, outside the material external influences on a person, the happiness of one soul, the happiness of love! Any person can understand it, but only God could recognize and prescribe it.
(About love and hate)
“Yes, love,” he thought again with perfect clarity, but not the love that loves for something, for something or for some reason, but the love that I experienced for the first time when, dying, I I saw my enemy and still fell in love with him. I experienced that feeling of love, which is the very essence of the soul and for which no object is needed. I still have that blissful feeling. Love your neighbors, love your enemies. To love everything is to love God in all manifestations. You can love a dear person with human love; but only the enemy can be loved by the love of God. And from this I experienced such joy when I felt that I love that person. What about him? Is he alive... Loving with human love, one can move from love to hatred; but God's love cannot change. Nothing, not death, nothing can destroy it. She is the essence of the soul. And how many people I hated in my life. And of all people, I did not love or hate anyone else like her. And he vividly imagined Natasha, not in the way he had imagined her before, with only her charm, joyful for himself; but for the first time imagined her soul. And he understood her feeling, her suffering, shame, repentance. He now for the first time understood the cruelty of his refusal, saw the cruelty of his break with her. “If only I could see her one more time. Once, looking into those eyes, say ... "
(Thoughts of Bolkonsky about love, life and death)
Prince Andrei not only knew that he would die, but he felt that he was dying, that he was already half dead. He experienced a consciousness of alienation from everything earthly and a joyful and strange lightness of being. He, without haste and without anxiety, expected what lay ahead of him. That formidable, eternal, unknown and distant, the presence of which he had not ceased to feel throughout his whole life, was now close to him and - by that strange lightness of being that he experienced - almost understandable and felt.
Before, he was afraid of the end. He twice experienced this terrible tormenting feeling of fear of death, the end, and now he no longer understood it.
The first time he experienced this feeling was when a grenade was spinning like a top in front of him and he looked at the stubble, at the bushes, at the sky and knew that death was in front of him. When he woke up after the wound and in his soul, instantly, as if freed from the oppression of life that held him back, this flower of love blossomed, eternal, free, not dependent on this life, he no longer feared death and did not think about it. The more he, in those hours of suffering solitude and semi-delusion that he spent after his wound, thought about the new beginning of eternal love revealed to him, the more he, without feeling it, renounced earthly life. Everything, to love everyone, to always sacrifice oneself for love, meant not to love anyone, meant not to live this earthly life. And the more he was imbued with this beginning of love, the more he renounced life and the more completely he destroyed that terrible barrier that, without love, stands between life and death. When, this first time, he remembered that he had to die, he said to himself: well, so much the better.
But after that night in Mytishchi, when the woman he desired appeared before him half-delirious, and when he, pressing her hand to his lips, wept quiet, joyful tears, love for one woman crept imperceptibly into his heart and again tied him to life. And joyful and disturbing thoughts began to come to him. Remembering that moment at the dressing station when he saw Kuragin, he now could not return to that feeling: he was tormented by the question of whether he was alive? And he didn't dare to ask.
Falling asleep, he thought about the same thing that he had been thinking about all this time - about life and death. And more about death. He felt closer to her.
"Love? What is love? he thought. “Love interferes with death. Love is life. Everything, everything that I understand, I understand only because I love. Everything is, everything exists only because I love. Everything is connected by her. Love is God, and to die means for me, a particle of love, to return to the common and eternal source.
But at the same moment he died, Prince Andrei remembered that he was sleeping, and at the same moment he died, he, having made an effort on himself, woke up.
“Yes, it was death. I died - I woke up. Yes, death is an awakening! - suddenly brightened in his soul, and the veil that had hidden the unknown until now was lifted before his spiritual gaze. He felt, as it were, the release of the previously bound strength in him and that strange lightness that had not left him since then.
Andrei Bolkonsky is the son of a rich, noble, respected nobleman of the Catherine era. Andrei is the most educated man of his time. Well-bred, smart, decent, honest, proud. Strong-willed, restrained and practical. Strongly developed self-esteem. At the beginning of the novel, married to a little princess, he feels unhappy, treats secular society with contempt and admits to Pierre that such a life is not for him. He loves work, strives for useful activity and cannot be satisfied with that brilliant, idle, but empty life, with which the people of his circle are completely satisfied. To change his way of life, he goes to war - military glory beckons him. His hero is Napoleon, and he wants to conquer his Toulon. He is captured by the activities of the headquarters, where Kutuzov himself notices in him the horizons of a statesman. Andrei Bolkonsky is on the battlefield during the Battle of Shengrabin. On the field of Austerlitz, he performs a heroic deed. Seriously wounded, he looks into the bottomless sky, which seems to speak of the futility of his desires. Andrew is disappointed. On the battlefield, he saw his idol, who seemed to him a small and insignificant man in a gray frock coat, admiring the many dead. Bolkonsky took this disappointment hard. Having recovered from the wound, having lost his wife, who died in childbirth, he decides to live only for himself and no longer serve. He gives his strength to loved ones. He is in charge of landscaping his property. Having set free 300 serfs, he replaced the rest of the corvée with dues. To help women, he ordered a learned grandmother in Bogucharovo, instructed the priest to teach peasant children for a salary. He read a lot, worked on drawing up a new military charter. But all this did not absorb his strength. His gaze was dead and dull. He became convinced of the futility of his activities under the conditions of the existing regime when he met with Arakcheev and Speransky.
Under the influence of a trip to Otradnoye, a meeting with Natasha Rostova, Andrei Bolkonsky returns to an active life, realizing that at the age of 30 it does not end yet. He opens another perception of life in love for Natasha Rostova. Communication with her awakens the best feelings in the hero. After Natasha's betrayal, his love for her did not fade until the end of his life, when he understood Natasha's suffering and forgave her. The ability for a deep feeling complements his inner wealth, his spiritual beauty. When the Patriotic War of 1812 began, Prince Andrei did not hesitate to join the army, where he began to command a regiment. Personal glory no longer attracted him. He understood that as a nobleman who loves his homeland, he should be where it is difficult, where he is most useful.
The path of Andrei Bolkonsky is the path to the people, the path to selfless service to the motherland. Bolkonsky belonged to that advanced part of the nobility from which the Decembrists emerged.
The image of Andrei Bolkonsky in the novel "War and Peace" (version 2)
The greatest work of the Russian writer - the novel by L. N. Tolstoy "War and Peace" - illuminates the important aspects of people's life, views, ideals, way of life and customs of various strata of society in peacetime and in the difficult days of the war. The author stigmatizes the high society and treats the Russian people with warmth and pride throughout the story. But the high society, which unites all the nobility, has its heroes. To those who are deeply indifferent to the fate of their homeland, Tolstoy contrasts the Bolkonsky and Rostov families. The unusual, bright and short life of Prince Andrei Bolkonsky is filled with constant moral quest, the desire to know the meaning of life, to goodness and truth. At the first acquaintance with Prince Andrei, we see in him a restless person, dissatisfied with his real life. Wishing to be useful to the Fatherland, dreaming of a military career, in 1805 Prince Bolkonsky left to serve in the army. At this time, he is fascinated by the fate of Bonaparte.
Bolkonsky begins his military service from the lower ranks among adjutants at Kutuzov's headquarters and, unlike staff officers such as Drubetskoy, does not seek an easy career and awards. Prince Andrei is a patriot by nature, he feels responsible for the fate of the Fatherland, for the fate of the Russian army, and considers it necessary to be where it is especially difficult, where the fate of what is dear to him is decided.
Among the main issues that concern Tolstoy are the true patriotism and heroism of the Russian people. Tolstoy in the novel talks a lot about the faithful sons of the Fatherland, who are ready to give their lives for the salvation of their homeland. One of them is Prince Andrei Bolkonsky: “Seeing Mack and hearing the details of his death, he realized that half of the campaign was lost, understood the whole difficulty of the position of the Russian troops and vividly imagined what awaited the army and the role that he would have to play in it. ".
Prince Andrei insists that he be sent to Bagration's detachment, which was instructed to detain the enemy, not to allow him to cut off "the route of communication with the troops marching from Russia." Kutuzov's words: “If one tenth of his detachment comes tomorrow, I will thank God” - did not stop Bolkonsky. “That's why I ask you to send me to this detachment,” he answered.
The birth of a child and at the same time the death of his wife, before whom he felt guilty, in my opinion, aggravated, so to speak, the spiritual crisis of Bolkonsky. He feels like his life is over. He was disappointed in everything: “I live and it’s not my fault, therefore, it’s necessary somehow better, without interfering with anyone, to live to death,” Prince Andrei says to Pierre. And, in my opinion, it was precisely under the influence of Pierre that the spiritual revival of Prince Andrei began: “... for the first time after Austerlitz, he saw that high, eternal sky ... and something long asleep, something better that was in him, suddenly joyfully and young woke up in his soul. And the meeting with Natasha Rostova in Otradnoe finally awakens him to life. Love for the cheerful, poetic Natasha gives birth to dreams of family happiness in Andrei's soul. Natasha became a second, new life for him. She had something that was not in the prince, and she harmoniously complemented him.
After confessing to Natasha, Andrey's ardor subsides. Now he feels responsible for Natasha, he wants it, and at the same time he is afraid. After listening to his father, Andrei postpones the wedding for a year. Natasha and Andrey are very different people. She is young, inexperienced, trusting and spontaneous. He already has a whole life behind him, the death of his wife, son, trials of difficult wartime, a meeting with death. Therefore, Andrei cannot fully understand the essence of a young girl who has absolutely no life experience. Natasha lives by feelings, Andrey - by reason.
And again Andrey suffers deep disappointment. In his absence, Natasha cannot live in peace, she needs movement, feelings, a change of scenery, new events, new acquaintances, and she finds herself in a world where Helen, Anatole, Prince Vasily live - cynical, cold representatives of high society. Natasha cannot resist the seducer - Anatole.
All dreams of a family were destroyed in Andrei’s soul: “That endless receding vault of the sky that stood above him before suddenly turned into a low vault that definitely pressed on him, in which everything was clear, but nothing was eternal and mysterious.” And Prince Andrei again returns to his element - to the army. There he should think first of all not about himself, but about the interests of his Fatherland, about the life of his soldiers. Bolkonsky “... was all devoted to the affairs of his regiment. He was caring for his people and officers and affectionate with them. In the regiment he was called "our prince." They were proud and loved."
On the eve of the Battle of Borodino, Prince Andrei was full of firm confidence that the Russian army would win the upcoming battle. He believed in the people, his soldiers, in the rightness of the struggle for the Fatherland. Andrei walked on the grass, admired the beauty of his native land, looked at flowers, earth, leaves, grasses. And in this peaceful and calm moment, he is mortally wounded. Enduring severe suffering, realizing that he is dying, before the sacrament of death he experiences a feeling of universal love and forgiveness. At this tragic moment, another meeting between Prince Andrei and Natasha takes place. War and suffering made Natasha an adult, now she understands how cruelly she acted with Bolkonsky, betrayed such a wonderful person because of her childhood passion. Natasha on her knees asks the prince for forgiveness. And he forgives her, he loves her again. He already loves with an unearthly love, and this love brightens up his last days in this world. Dying, Bolkonsky connects with eternity. He always aspired to this, but could not unite the heavenly and the earthly. Prince Andrei managed to do this by gaining faith.
The image of Andrei Bolkonsky in the novel "War and Peace" (3rd option)
Introducing readers to Andrei Bolkonsky, Tolstoy draws a portrait of his hero. Prince Andrei Bolkonsky was short, a very handsome young man with definite and dry features. In Scherer's salon, where we first meet him, he has a tired, bored look, often "a grimace spoils his handsome face." But when Pierre approached him, Bolkonsky "smiled with an unexpectedly kind and pleasant smile."
During a conversation with Pierre, “his dry face kept trembling with the nervous animation of every muscle; eyes, in which the fire of life had previously seemed extinguished, now shone with a radiant bright brilliance. And so everywhere and always: dry, proud and cold with everyone who is unpleasant to him (and he is unpleasant to careerists, soulless egoists, bureaucrats, mental and moral nonentities), Prince Andrei is kind, simple, sincere, frank, with simple faces, alien to any falsehood and lies. He respects and appreciates those in whom he sees a serious inner content.
Prince Andrei is a richly gifted person. He has an extraordinary mind, characterized by a propensity for serious, deep work of thought and introspection; at the same time, he is completely alien to daydreaming and the “nebulous philosophizing” associated with it. However, this is not a dry, rational person. He has a rich spiritual life, deep feelings. Prince Andrei is a man of strong will, an active, creative nature, he strives for broad public and state activities. This need is supported in him by his inherent ambition, the desire for glory and power. It should be said, however, that Prince Andrei is not capable of bargaining with his conscience. He is honest, and the desire for glory is combined in him with a thirst for selfless deeds.
A complex and deep nature, Prince Andrei lives in a period of public excitement that swept the educated circles of the nobility during the Patriotic War, in the atmosphere in which the future Decembrists were formed. In such an environment, the deep, sober mind of Prince Andrei, enriched with a variety of knowledge, is critical of the surrounding reality, looking for the meaning of life in activities that would bring him moral satisfaction.
The war awakened ambition in him. The dizzying career of Napoleon makes him dream of his Toulon, but he thinks to win it not by evading dangers at headquarters, but in battle, with his courage. This is how Prince Andrei acts near Austerlitz. But after being seriously wounded near Austerlitz, he has a sharp mental reaction: he is convinced of the pettiness of his ambitious goals.
Under the influence of everything he experienced in the war, Prince Andrei falls into a gloomy, depressed mood, and is experiencing a severe mental crisis. In a conversation with Pierre, who visited him in Bogu-charovo at that time, he, irritable, nervous, develops a theory of life in front of his interlocutor, which is completely unusual for him. "To live for myself, to avoid now these two evils (remorse and illness) - that's all my wisdom now." But Pierre does not believe this "wisdom" - and rightly so: all the qualities of Prince Andrei and his life practice (measures to improve the life of the peasants, their partial release) contradict this.
The meeting with Natasha in Otradnoe brought Prince Andrei back to life. He had a need for a broad public activity. He goes to St. Petersburg and meets here with the most prominent figure of the era - Speransky. But soon the nature of Speransky, a man of a cold mind, repels him. He felt falseness in Speransky - and his illusions about the possibility of fruitful activity among bureaucrats and court parties were dispelled. He is again disappointed.
Prince Andrei has a great will to live, and to live precisely with people: “It is necessary that life not go on for me alone, that it be reflected on everyone and that everyone should live with me.”
The danger hanging over the country transformed Prince Andrei. The patriotism of Prince Andrei is clearly articulated in his words spoken on the eve of Borodin: “The French have ruined my house and are going to ruin Moscow, insulted and insult me every minute. And Timokhin and the whole army think the same way. They must be executed."
The path of Prince Andrei is the path of gradual rapprochement with the people. He sees his main purpose in serving the people. Prince Andrei takes care of his peasants: he lists several hundred of his serfs as “free cultivators” (i.e., releases them to freedom, endowing them with land), for others he replaces corvée with dues, etc.
When the Patriotic War began, Prince Andrei voluntarily joined the army. He refuses to serve in the headquarters under the "person of the sovereign." In his opinion, only service in the army will give him confidence that he will be useful in the war. Having received a regiment in command, Prince Andrei draws closer to the people even more. “In the regiment they called him our prince, they were proud of him and loved him.” Thus, ordinary Russian soldiers played the main role in the spiritual renewal of Prince Andrei.
A severe wound received on the Borodino field interrupts the activities of Prince Andrei. But his inquisitive thought continues to work even during his illness. Lying at the dressing station, he sums up his life path.
Prince Andrei passionately wants to live, and at the same time he thinks: “But isn’t it all the same now? .. And what will happen there (that is, after death.) And what was it like here? Why did I feel sorry for parting with my life? There was something in this life that I did not understand and do not understand.
And in these moments, a fiery thought dawns on him about the enormous, universal, all-forgiving love for people, which he would bring if he remained alive.
But Prince Andrei was not destined to recover from his wound. In Yaroslavl, where the Rostovs transported him, he realized that he was dying. Half-delirious, in hours of suffering solitude, he painfully thinks about what eternal love is, and comes to the realization that it requires renunciation of life: “Everything, to love everyone, to always sacrifice oneself for love meant not to love anyone, it meant not to live this earthly life." It was a clear sign of a mental breakdown.
However, when Natasha was again next to him, Prince Andrei again returned to the thought of life and earthly love. “Everything that is, everything exists only because I love,” he argues. Thus two contradictory assertions struggle in his soul: love is life and love is death.
The second wins. “His soul was not in a normal state,” the author explains. Prince Andrei eventually comes to an idealistic understanding of love and death: “Love is God, and to die means that for me, a particle of love, I must return to the common and eternal source.” He himself understood that something was missing in these thoughts, that in them "something was one-sided, personal, mental - there was no evidence."
Shortly before his death, he has a heavy dream. In a dream, he again fights for life, experiencing an excruciating fear of death. But death wins even in a dream, and Prince Andrei wakes up with the thought that death is liberation. With this thought, he dies.
His dying thoughts are the thoughts of a man broken by illness and suffering, unusual for the sober mind of Prince Andrei. The spiritual image of Prince Andrei is not characterized by these dying thoughts, colored by mysticism, but by his inquisitive, sober, materialistic mind, his desire for social activity, his love for the people, the struggle for whose happiness he would devote his life if he had not died from a wound. Death interrupted his quest.
The spiritual appearance of Prince Andrei and all his activities give the right to assume that if he had remained alive, his searches would have led him to the camp of the Decembrists.
Andrei Bolkonsky. Osipova D. 10 B Appearance. “Prince Bolkonsky was short, a very handsome young man with definite and dry features. Everything in his figure, from the tired, bored look to the quiet measured step, represented the sharpest contrast with his little, lively wife. Apparently, everyone in the drawing room was not only familiar to him, but they were already so tired that it was very boring for him to look at them and listen to them. Of all the faces that bored him, the face of his pretty wife seemed to bore him the most. With a grimace that spoiled his handsome face, he turned away from her ... ” Andrei Bolkonsky is the son of a wealthy, revered and respected nobleman of the Catherine era. Andrei is the most educated man of his time. He has a negative attitude towards secular society. He loves work, strives for useful activities. To change his lifestyle, he goes to war - military glory beckons him. His hero is Napoleon, and he wants to conquer his Toulon. On the field of Austerlitz, seriously wounded, he looks into the bottomless sky, which seems to speak of the futility of his desires. Andrew is disappointed. On the battlefield, he saw his idol, who seemed to him a small and insignificant man in a gray frock coat, admiring the many dead. Bolkonsky took this disappointment hard. Decides to live only for himself and no longer serve. He is engaged in the improvement of his estate. Having set free 300 serfs, he replaced the rest of the corvée with dues. To help women, he ordered a learned grandmother in Bogucharovo, instructed the priest to teach peasant children for a salary. He worked on the drafting of a new military charter. He became convinced of the futility of his activities under the conditions of the existing regime when he met with Arakcheev and Speransky. He offers her a hand and a heart, but at the insistence of his father postpones their marriage for a year and goes abroad. Shortly before returning, Prince Andrei receives a letter of refusal from the bride. The reason for the refusal is Natasha's romance with Anatole Kuragin. This turn of events becomes a heavy blow for Bolkonsky.
Under the influence of a trip to Otradnoye, a meeting with Natasha Rostova, Andrei Bolkonsky returns to an active life, realizing that at the age of 30 it does not end yet. He opens another perception of life in love for Natasha Rostova. To drown out the pain of disappointment in the woman he loves, Prince Andrei devotes himself entirely to the service. Personal glory no longer attracted him. He understood that as a nobleman who loves his homeland, he should be where it is difficult, where he is most useful. Participates in the war of 1812 against Napoleon. During the Battle of Borodino, he is wounded. He accidentally meets the Rostov family, and they take him under his wing. Natasha, never ceasing to blame herself for betraying her fiancé and realizing that she still loves him, asks for forgiveness from Andrey, in the Rostovs' house. After Natasha's betrayal, his love for her did not fade away until the end of his life, when he understood Natasha's suffering and forgave her . The ability for a deep feeling was supplemented by his inner wealth, his spiritual beauty. He managed to rise above his own resentment, understand Natasha's suffering, feel the power of her love. He is visited by spiritual enlightenment, a new understanding of happiness and the meaning of life. The main thing that Tolstoy revealed in his hero continued after his death in his son, Nikolenka. This is discussed in the epilogue of the novel. The boy is carried away by the Decembrist ideas of Uncle Pierre and, turning mentally to his father, he says: "Yes, I will do what even he would be pleased with." Perhaps Tolstoy intended to connect the image of Nikolenka with the emerging Decembrism.
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Any reader who thoughtfully delves into the legendary epic novel by Leo Tolstoy "War and Peace" encounters images of amazing heroes. One of these is Andrei Bolkonsky, an outstanding person with a multifaceted character.
“... A short, very handsome young man with certain dry features” - this is how Leo Nikolayevich Tolstoy describes his hero at the first meeting of the reader with him at the evening of Anna Pavlovna Sherer. - Everything in his figure, from a tired, bored look to a quiet measured step, represented the sharpest contrast with his small, lively wife.
Apparently, everyone who was in the living room was not only familiar to him, but he was already so tired of looking at them and listening to them that he was very bored ... ”Most of all, the young man was bored when he saw the face of his wife.
It would seem that nothing at this evening could cheer up the young man, and he perked up only when he saw his friend, Pierre Bezukhov. From this we can conclude that Andrei appreciates friendship.
The young prince Bolkonsky has such qualities as nobility, respect for elders (it is enough to trace how he loved his father, calling him “You, father ...”), as well as education and patriotism.
In his fate, a time of severe trials will come, but for now he is a young man whom secular society loves and accepts.
The values of Andrei Bolkonsky throughout the novel "War and Peace" are gradually changing. At the beginning of the work, an ambitious young man, by all means, longs to receive human recognition and glory as a brave warrior. “I love nothing but glory, human love. Death, wounds, loss of family, nothing scares me,” he exclaims, wanting to go to war with Napoleon.
We suggest that you familiarize yourself with the “characteristics of the Rostov family” in Leo Tolstoy’s novel “War and Peace”
Secular life seems empty to him, and the young man wants to be useful to society. At first he serves as an adjutant at Kutuzov, but in the battle of Austerlitz he is wounded and ends up in the hospital. The family considers Andrei missing, but for Bolkonsky himself, this time has become very important for a reassessment of values. The young man is disappointed in his former idol Napoleon, seeing him as a worthless man, rejoicing in the death of people.
“At that moment, Napoleon seemed to him such a small, insignificant person in comparison with what was now happening between his soul and this high, endless sky with clouds running across it.” Now that the goal of Bolkonsky's life - to achieve fame and recognition - has collapsed, the hero is seized by strong emotional experiences.
Having recovered, he decides not to fight anymore, but to devote himself to his family. Unfortunately, this did not happen.
The next blow for Andrei Bolkonsky was the death during childbirth of his wife Elizabeth. If it were not for the meeting with his friend Pierre Bezukhov, who tried to convince him that life is not over, and that it is necessary to fight, despite the trials, it would be much harder for the hero to survive such grief. “I live and it’s not my fault, therefore, it’s necessary somehow better, without interfering with anyone, to live to death,” he lamented, sharing his experiences with Pierre.
But, thanks to the sincere support of a comrade who convinced a friend that “one must live, one must love, one must believe,” the hero of the novel survived. During this difficult period, Andrei not only cheered up his soul, but also met his long-awaited love.
For the first time, Natasha and Andrei meet at the Rostov estate, where the prince comes to spend the night. Disappointed in life, Bolkonsky understands that finally the happiness of true and bright love smiled at him.
A pure and purposeful girl opened his eyes to the need to live for the people, to do good for others. A new, hitherto unknown feeling of love flared up in Andrei's heart, which Natasha also shared.
They got engaged, and maybe they would make a great couple. But circumstances intervened again. In the life of Andrei's beloved, a fleeting passion appeared, which led to disastrous consequences. It seemed to her that she fell in love with Anatole Kuragin, and although the girl later repented of treason, Andrei could no longer forgive her and treat her the same way. “Of all people, I didn’t love anyone else and didn’t hate like her,” he admitted to his friend Pierre. The engagement was broken off.
Going to the next war, Prince Bolknonsky no longer pursues ambitious plans. His main goal is to protect the Motherland and his people from the attacked enemy. Now Andrei is fighting alongside ordinary people, soldiers and officers, and does not consider it shameful. “... He was all devoted to the affairs of his regiment, he was caring about his people and officers and affectionate with them. In the regiment they called him our prince, they were proud of him and loved him ... ”- Leo Tolstoy writes, characterizing his favorite hero.
The wound in the Battle of Borodino was fatal for Prince Andrei.
Already in the hospital, he meets with his former lover Natasha Rostova, and feelings between them flare up with renewed vigor. “...Natasha, I love you too much. More than anything…” he admits.
However, this reborn love has no chance, because Bolkonsky is dying. The devoted girl spends the last days of Andrey's life next to him.
He not only knew that he was going to die, but he felt that he was dying, that he was already half dead. He experienced the consciousness of alienation from everything earthly and the joyful and strange lightness of being. He, without haste and without anxiety, expected what lay ahead of him. That formidable, eternal, unknown, distant, the presence of which he never ceased to feel throughout his life, was now close to him and - by that strange lightness of being that he experienced - almost understandable and felt ... ".
So sadly ended the earthly life of Andrei Bolkonsky. He experienced many sorrows and troubles, but the path to eternity opened ahead.
Every thoughtful reader can draw a conclusion: how much grief and misfortune the war has brought to mankind. Indeed, if not for the mortal wound that Andrei received on the battlefield, perhaps their love with Natasha Rostova would have had a happy continuation. After all, they loved each other so much and could symbolize the ideal of family relationships. But, alas, a person does not spare his own kind, and ridiculous confrontations take away many lives of people who, left to live, could bring considerable benefit to the Fatherland.
It is this thought that runs through the entire work of Leo Tolstoy.
